The Culprit

Jack has had some sleeping problems as of late. He wants to sleep in our bed and when we take him back to his bed, he starts to complain, cry and just say " I want Mami's and Papi's bed."

For awhile when this first started , we thought the culprit was Monster's Inc, the Pixar movie. Jack would say, There are no monsters in the closet or under the bed, and that was our clue that maybe he shouldn't see the movie. Even though it is cute, think about it, the premise of the movie is that monsters get their kicks out of scaring kids. We banned that movie , and he has not seen it in a long time. Which we thought that would take away the idea of monsters in the closet, but lately with Jack wanting to sleep in our bed more and more, he has claimed a new culprit that has been added to his fear of the night list.

Diesel 10 - a character from Thomas the Tank Engine.
This character is just mean, and in every episode that he is in, he is calling out the other engines "Spotty Boilers, Ratty engines, Stinky Steamies." All the while he growls every time he sees them - GGGGRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR!!!!!!!!!!

Jack never liked this character, but we would always tell him that Diesel 10 was just being silly and in the end, he would help out Thomas. Even when we would play, I would give Diesel a nice tone of voice. A c0uple of days ago, I asked Jack why he insisted on coming to our bed. He said cause Diesel 10 is there.
The countless episodes of Diesel growling is in Jack's head. How do you get out a bad idea out from a child's memory? We can tell Jack over and over again that Diesel is just a silly guy, he is not real, that he has a silly face. But that tiny fear that Jack has had toward this character since he was little is just there, and it doesn't go away.
At this point, Brian and I are not sure on what to do, and what is right and what is wrong when it comes to something like this.

The Real Name

Here is a spoiler - Jack's name is not his real name. That has been his nickname since Day 1 of life.
Brian and I always wondered when would be a good time to tell him what his real name is. do you tell him when he is a kid? What age? 6 years? 10 years old? I really wasn't sure of when to do it or how, but this has been solved for me already.

Somehow, Jack found out his real name. I never told him, never has Brian. About three weeks ago, I said " Hey Jack, let's put on your shoes." He responded back with, No,my name is not Jack, it's Jonathan."
I was thrown and said to myself "OK , here is your time." I asked him what he wanted to be called now, Jack or Jonathan.
He said Jonathan, which by the way, felt very strange to hear coming out of him. That lasted for about 5 minutes because I said something else, and he corrected me with "No, my name is Jack."


Now, if you ask him what his name is , he will say Jack. And if you ask him what his other name is, he might say Jonathan. Depends on his mood of the day.

The Love of Water

I cannot swim. Lie, yes I can. I have done it in the pool before. But I will not swim in the deep end. I am sure that I can do it if I go from one end of the pool to the other. But just the thought of being in water in that I cannot feel the ground freaks me out.
Jack was like me for about two years. He would hold on tight to one of us, or he would not like it if we just held his hands as we spun him around in the water.

This year has changed everything. I can't say what we exactly did, or what we said, but all of a sudden , our son loves the water. LOVES THE WATER.
He loves putting the life jacket on, loves just wading in the water, loves not feeling the ground and just moving his legs in the open water.
Is this my kid? Thankfully yes. Jack got his bravery from Brian for sure. We try to encourage him a lot in the water by throwing out a lot of compliments like we are so proud of him for being in the water, he is such a good swimmer, he is getting better every day.
And it is true. Nothing makes me more proud than to see my son just swim in the pool and have a huge smile on his face and enjoying every moment of it. I become even more proud when I see other parents trying to encourage their kids to swim and let go, and they see Jack and talk of him as an example -

See. look at that kid? He is swimming. He likes it.

Yes, everyone. Feel free to use my son as a positive role model. Also feel free to see us as the awesome parents of the awesome kid that loves to swim.

I am proud of you Jack. It may be only swimming to you, but to me, it just shows what an amazing son you are to us.

The Insult or the Joke?

I recently had my hair cut short, very short.

Jack was sitting with me on the couch last night when he turned around, looked at me and said

" Bwahahaaaaaa, look at your hair."

Was that an insult? Is my son making fun of my hair? Or was he just saying, hey look at your hair!

I was not sure what to make of it but I started to laugh and then just gave him a hug. You have three chances to make fun of your mother .
That was one.

The Bedtime Punishment

Tonight, Jack kept jumping on the sofa, and Brian and I kept telling him not to do it. He kept jumping anyways and when someone else tried to tell Jack on why he should not jump, he responded back with a " PPPPFFFFFTTTTT. A full on raspberry.
Funny Right?
Except I didn't find it so funny, as no kid of mine will respond to anyone in that matter. So I became the strict mom, took him to bed, and told him it was bedtime. All the while explaining to him on why you shouldn't do raspberries to anyone.
He gave me the saddest look, gave me the pouty face, and even tried to plead with me that he wanted to watch TV. I told him that this is what happens when you don't listen and you don't obey, you don't watch TV and you go straight to bed. I left him in his room and he fell asleep about 10 minutes later.

What killed me was the way he went to bed. We didn't read a story, we didn't do the lovely "Good night, I love you" routine that we always do. He went to bed sad, upset, and feeling left alone. His look alone killed me.
I know that there will be times when he will go to bed like this. He has had time outs before and he learns his lessons from them. But I always would prefer the time outs or the punishments to happen in the middle of the day. Because then we could have the rest of the day to make up for the fact that he had such a time out. I don't want him to go to bed sad. I know that I can't ever prevent that, but as a mom, there is this force, this emotional force that makes you go above and beyond to protect your child. Yes, even to protect your child from feeling bad while they get in trouble.
I did say I love you right before he closed his eyes. That makes me feel a bit better.

The Parental Invite

Brian and I are friendly people. And wherever we go, we seem to meet new people. Cool people that especially have cool kids that are about Jack's age.
Once we meet those people , we always ask these internal questions to ourselves" So, if this person is cool, and their kid seems to get along with my kid, do we ask for their number? Can we ask them to see them again?

It's kind of like Parental Dating. You see the parents,you like them, you seem to get along with them and have the same interests that they have. And your number one interest is that your kids get along. Which they do! So, when it is it a good time to ask to see them again? Because that great moment that your kid is having right now with their kid, he can have again and again and again.

Brian and I went thru these roller coasters last Sunday. Jack had a cough and perhaps an ear infection, so off to Urgent Aid we went. As we went into our second hour waiting there, who would come in but a mom, dad, and a child about Jack's age carrying Woody and Buzz from Toy Story. Well, of course Jack's eye lit up and immediately wanted to go over to play with the kid. We encouraged him , and the little boy loved that Jack was wearing a Thomas the tank engine shirt. Friendship soldified.

As the boys played in the waiting room, Brian talked with the dad ,I talked with the mom, and it was as if Brian and I were telepathically telling each other the same question ;

Alright, do we ask for a number this time?"

Before we could answer each other, we were called into the doc's office. By the time we came back out, the family was gone.

We talked about the situation over dinner and it continued onto Walgreens where we were waiting for our prescription for Jack. Who happened to walk down our aisle at that moment was the dad. The dad from the doc's office. At this moment, Brian and I gave each other the golden look, the look that said That is it. This is meant to be. So Brian did ask for his number, the dad got ours and we were left with a feeling of "WE DID IT!!! We got a friend for Jack - for life!

That was a week ago. We haven't called the parents yet. They haven't called us either. We figure we should call them soon before that memory of the doctor's office becomes a vague memory. Now that we have crossed that path and answered our own question of should we , shouldn't we, now we have to ask ourselves of when we , when shouldn't we call. Seems easy enough no?
Where is the book for parental rules on this one?

The 4th of July

Jack,

This was one of the most important milestones of your life so far. And it is not because you wanted to see fireworks, or because you are old enough to stay up late to see the fireworks. This 4th of July, you ended up loving the pool. You loved it so much that you wanted us to let you go as we held you and spun you around in the pool. You may be big, but you are not big enough to float in a 4 ft deep pool. You need floaties first my friend.
And you loved the lifejacket, and the donut floaty, and just basically swimming around by yourself. Clearly, you are your father's child, since your mom cannot stand the thought of floating in water where her feet cannot touch the ground. But you loved that weightlessness, the feeling of your feet being free in the water, and the way you just bobbed in the water with utter glee was the best moment that you could have given your dad and I.
I am glad that you were feeling fearless enough to jump in the water, to just semi swim as we held onto your one hand. You loved every moment of it, so let's take some time out to give thanks to Doug and Marcia Berg, for their fantastic party and their fantastic pool.
PS - They said we can go over whenever we want. Wink!

My favorite moment of this day was when the sun was setting, and Brian and Jack were the only ones in the pool. The orange sunset shone on their little faces and they just swam circles around each other. Putting that in the memory box for sure.