Lego

Dear John,

You have loved Lego for some time now, but you usually get me to assemble the set and then you carefully play with it.

Later, though, I expect to be asked when you first started following Lego directions yourself.

The answer, as it turns out, is just after you turned four.

Love,
Mom

Ballet or Play?

Dear John,

We took you and your sister to see the ballet version of Snow White today and you were most disappointed!  The queen and the off-stage voice of the mirror both spoke and the dwarves moved in a jump/skip and not in fluid dance movements.  Halfway through the production, you announced (loudly), "Hey, you said this was a ballet!  This is not a ballet, this is a play!"

I found it so interesting that you would, at three, understand the distinction and I myself had wondered about the dialogue... I had never before heard a ballet include any speaking roles.

Then, after the show, when your sister was asking about your favorite character (hers was the evil queen), you said the mirror.  The mirror, your sister explained, was not a character.  We did not take the time to explain about props, however, because you immediately rebutted, "It was a character!  It talked!"

So there you go.  At the age of three, you have had enough exposure to the arts to argue the difference between a play and a ballet and know that inanimate objects can be characters.

I love you, smart boy!

Love, Mom

Setting the Stage

Dear John,

We went by Southwestern today.  I needed to take care of some things in preparation for a field trip with my students next month.  One of those things was looking at the Fine Arts Building to see what kind of art they have displayed and to make sure it is 3rd grade appropriate.  (It was.)

On our way through the Fine Arts Building, though, we saw something magical happening.  A group of people were "making a play."  (They were creating the set.)

You and your sister insisted on watching them.  We asked permission and then you sat, entranced, as a man cut foam boards to look like cement molding and a woman sponge painted faux bricks to give them depth.

That your six year old sister had the attention span for this was not surprising to me; that you did was.  In fact, we eventually left because she was bored... not because of you.

You asked about the tools and the ladders.  You wanted to know about the buildings and the props.  Why did they have a trash can?  (It was part of the street scene.)  Why was that door in the air?  (They would probably add stairs later.)

Then the man (I think he was the professor) showed you the most amazing thing ever... the building the woman was painting moved and you could see the inside!  (It was a flower shop... a little flower shop... full of horrors, I'm afraid.)

On our way out, another woman came out and the man told us she was in the show.  I recognized her as the actress who played Mouse in A Year with Frog and Toad which we saw in the fall.  So I prompted you, saying, "Can you tell her what you know?"

To which you replied, as is now our family joke, with the line from that show, "Toad looks funny in a bathing suit!"

The actress laughed!

You beamed.

I wonder if you will like the theater even more as you get older.  I noticed with The Nutcracker that you were even more enthralled by it than your sister.  I think it could be a fun outlet for your busy mind and intense emotions.

Think about it.

Love,
Mom

The Root of the Problem

Dear John,

You have continued to struggle with your temper and escalating reactions to situations.  We changed you from Children's Courtyard/Xplor back to Kid's Kottage and while things have certainly improved, they are not resolved.

You have stopped the constant pants wetting and are even dry through naps, which is nice.  You continue, however, to throw fits when you do not get your way and refuse to take time outs, running from teachers, refusing to come to them, and generally making adults track you down literally kicking and screaming.

The other day it was over a time out for jumping off of the see-saw when you were told not to.  Another day it was a time out over throwing a ball at a kid.  One day it was having to clean up.  Yesterday it was not getting to have your breakfast at home, having to wait 15 minutes until we got to school.

I wonder if it's just you being three.  I wonder if it's your strong-willed personality.  I wonder if it's a sign of intelligence.  I wonder if it's something else, something bad.

You know what the problem is, though, because you told me today.  You told me that you want to be good and make good choices, but your brain won't let you.  Your brain tells you to do bad choices.

I don't know what to say to a three year old who talks this way.

I pointed out that you are your brain and that every brain has a "child voice" and a "grown-up voice" and that we should listen to our "grown-up voices."

You could understand this idea of your brain being a kid.  You said you would like to put your brain in time out.

If only it were that easy.

But I think you do know what you are talking about.  I think the root of the problem is your brain, not your temper or your age.  I think we need to get this brain under control.

Soon.

Love,
Mom

Blood Sugar

Dear John,

Tonight, you were, once again, complaining of being thirsty and insisting you needed a water bottle in bed.

You also have been having many, many potty accidents in the last few months.

You also still refuse to eat anything that is not a carb. (With the exception of dairy... you do drink milk and eat cheese and yogurt.)

On the one hand, these are signs of a three year old striking his independence.  On the other hand, they are also signs of diabetes.

So, I took your blood sugar.  It was 250.  Which is just too high.

To be certain, I ran my own (104) and then redid yours.  It was now 170.

Hmmm.  But which reading was more accurate?  The 250 or the 170?  The 170 was still on the high side.  Your meal was, as usual, carb-o-licious, but it was two hours after your last carby-post meal snack and almost three hours from the start of dinner.

So I did what I think any reasonable mother would do.  No, I didn't let it go.  I went for a third, tie breaking prick.  And I bribed you with a brand new toy from the cabinet to get it.

Final reading?  120.  High normal.

What does it all mean?  Well, I spent some time on google and found a very, very useful article about inaccurate readings in small children.  Unlike older children and adults, small children do not necessarily wash their hands when they eat sticky things like fruit juice and fruit juice on the hands means extra undigested sugar in the blood for the prick.

In addition to your normal Cheez-Its and cheerios (and string cheese and yogurt) for dinner, you had one of your most exotic choices: kiwi.  A very juicy, sugary, sticky on the hands treat.

I am ready to call that the culprit and move on.  I think I was rubbing the kiwi juice off with each prick and that's why the levels were getting lower and although I think that 120 is the high end of normal, it still wasn't with perfectly clean hands, so there may have been some kiwi in that test as well.

But I am keeping my eye on you.  And next time, I'll wash your hands.

Love,
Mom

On Being Three (and a Science Center)

Dear John,

Saturday was a pretty typical day for you.  There was a birthday party for Danielle Hazen, but you didn't get to go because of an event on Friday (spitting at your mother is an event, not just an error).  You made the most of it and did well Saturday morning (because of the threat that you would not be allowed out of your room during your Gram's visit).  Then, having set yourself to having a good day, became absolutely adorable.

I have many, many people in my life right now trying to convince me that this is just a day in the life of a 3 year old and that this too, shall pass.  I am waiting for you to convince me by turning four and putting these random moments of insanity (really, spitting?!?, why in the world would you spit on your mother!?!) aside for more reasonable displays of irritation.

In any case, I brought home an "I Spy" bottle for you and you loved it.  It reminded you of the science center at school and in "Give a Mouse a Cookie" fashion, I gave you a bottle and you asked for a science center to go with it.

And even as I am aghast when you act out in extreme ways, I am simultaneously unimpressed when you show extreme curiosity, innovation, and intelligence.  I supposed the one may go with the other and if I am going to be blow away by your negative behaviors, I should pay closer attention to your positive ones... and you have so very many, my very, very smart boy.

I made you a Science Center right away, mostly because I could and you spent the rest of the evening engaged, by yourself, in the act of transferring fake snow from one container to another, hiding objects and finding them again, and in general, being a scientist.

the "I Spy" bottles are on the window sill, along with your non-fiction books

On the wall, I put up the chart from How Deep is the Ocean, which Mrs. Hazen bought for you.

Most of the supplies are from your sister's birthday party... when we mixed Chemical X in Professor Utonium's laboratory.

John being a scientist with his insta-snow.

I am impressed that you thought to ask for a Science Center.  I am impressed with the way you digest non-fiction books, looking through the pictures, asking for the captions to be read to you, remembering what the captions really say even a month or more later when I try to summarize to save myself some time.

I am impressed with your vocabulary and the way you explain things.  Today at the zoo, you told Mr. Hazen that your legs had sore in them and that drinking water (while sitting) made the sore go out of your legs and back into the ground.  But then when you walk around some more on the ground, the sore goes back into your legs.

I have seen you tell your sister how to do her homework... it was a page of "greater than" and "less than" and you were able to count the sets and compare them just a tiny bit quicker than she could.

I can tell you are so ready to read.  You want me to tell you signs and if there is enough of a picture, you will make a reasonable guess ("Flower Store" for a sign with a big magnolia on it) and love it when you can use environmental print ("that says 'Chick-a-lay' Mama, I read it").

In all of your Lego sets, although I have put together almost all of them, you were able, with only a small amount of fine motor help in pushing down small pieces, put together a small set that had six or seven steps to it.  You read the directions yourself and built it on your own.  The thing that keeps you from doing later sets is attention span... you are still three years old.

You really are a brilliant boy and I have to remember that the same things that make your little brain work so hard to figure out what signs say, what sea creatures are called, and whether four or six is greater, those same neurons are working furiously to figure out how to get away with things, how to establish autonomy and control, how to be three.

I guess I will have to resign myself: you are just an exceptional three year old.

Love,
Mom

Rewriting the Magic

Dear John,


Someone, or maybe it was the world in general, tried to tell me long ago that the dreams we make for ourselves as small children will be replaced by more realistic dreams as we grow.  That childhood is for play and adulthood is for work.  I was taught to enjoy my childhood while it lasted because it would be over before I knew it.  The Toys R Us commercials sang Peter Pan's song denying the inevitability of growing up and as charming as it was to say "I won't grow up!" we all knew it was a lie.  Christopher Robin leaves the Hundred Acre Wood and Wendy leaves the nursery.  Even in song, I was given the cautionary tale of Jackie Paper, who one day woke up and forgot to go to Cherry Lane.

But....

This Christmas Break I have played computer games and board games.  I have built Legos and constructed a play kitchen out of cardboard boxes and duct tape.  And in all of these endeavors, not only has your dad indulged me, he has been right there with me.  He built his own Lego creations.  He and I negotiated for turns on the computer.  We played board games with faux French accents (okay, that was over Thanksgiving).  And we still got together with some other friends and played some D&D.  I fought a Bugbear and won.  Your dad told the story and invented a new voice for some shrewd business-halfings.

Then this evening, I sat in the playroom this evening, watching some silly show about fairies and witches, contemplating playing another computer game, surrounded by Legos, listening to the sound of your dad playing some war game with his friends on XBox.


Did we forget to grow up?  Or is growing up just so very different than I thought it would be?

Either way, I wish I could go back and tell my child self to feel free to dream of being a grown-up, with her own house, with her own rules about silly things like bedtimes and desserts, who wakes up everyday on the never-ending sleepover with her best friend.  Because right now, in this moment, I am living my childhood dream and I never, not ever, dared to dream it would be this good.

Nor did I ever stop to understand that in the midst of all of this joy, I would have your childhood, and your sister's, to share in.

Love,
Mom