Shabbat Shalom...Hey!

Just a quick note before the sun sets and the Sabbath begins...

I realized today that I DID go back to work. I somehow took on the monthly preschool newsletter, both the writing and the conversion from paper to an electronic format. My friends (put that in quotes) volunteered me for the Craft fair committee (or crap fair as one friend put it). I am still working part-time as marketing director for the basketball program (check out www.bfbasketballacademy.com) and I am attempting to write a book.

And, on the side I am take care of 2 boys with less than 10 hours of childcare per week. Um, I may as well go back to an office full-time and get benefits. But, who write's the newsletters in Linda Hirshman's world. It is what makes my son's preschool a community rather than a simple school. I like the Kehilla.

I'm going to work!

Well, maybe, no I don't think so. I do work part-time from home, but Linda Hirshmans article in the Post made me reconside my SAHM position. I like the way she thinks, but without reading her full book, I can't critique it one way or the other.

I do find certain humor in being one of the many Mommy Bloggers out there whom she mentions. I am not quite sure how I ended up here as a SAHM taking on 95% of domestic chores, though my husband pitches in. A Lot. He does most of the grocery shopping (I make the list and cook the food), he gets gas for my car, he does the laundry 75% of the time, he drives the boys to school in the morning and drops off dry cleaning on the way, he reads them stories at night, and so on.

Wait a minute...what the Hell do I do all day, if he is doing all that?!?!? Blogging for one thing! ;-) And building elaborate lego zoos and garages. And buying teacher presents and organizing swim lessons.

Maybe I should go back to work full time, I wouldn't mind the paycheck and I think I would get more done. That's right. I would get more done, because by staying home and having infinte time, I get caught up in the minutae and create loads of little things to do.

Buying baskets to organize library books at the Container Store becomes a whole event. Organizing outgrown clothes by size in dustproof containers takes more time. If I went to work, I would simply work, come home, make dinner, clean it & go to bed. Maybe a load of laundry would get done, or I could afford resources to do the laundry for me!!

Oooh, work is looking tempting. But, who would sit with Nate & eat popsicles, or dig for treasure in the bag yard? I hate to cop-out, but I really have no answer. Are there any countries where there is balance? If I went back to work, who would watch my children? Decent daycares & nannies charge more per hour than I make after taxes.

It is NOT fair, I would like to work, but I do want to be home with my kids when they get home from school. My mom was home then went back to work, so I did the home with mom and latch-key thing. I liked when she was home. Selfish of me, I know, but there you have it.

Ok, this American dilemma is not getting solved tonight, and certainly not by my blog.

In touch

My 3, nearly 4, year-old is should be a sixties love child. He is very in touch with his feelings and able to verbalize it to the point of being melodramatic. (Insert slow, sad, deep voice) "Mommy. I'm feeling very sad today cause I miss Grandpa." I try to listen to him, acknowledge his feelings but not let him wallow.

So, today I decided as a treat to take him to see Cars the new Pixar movie. It was his second time going to the movie theater and he knew popcorn and candy would be involved. He was pretty psyched. My babysitter arrived at 2:00 pm, and I RACED to Wheaton, stopping for gas on Plyers Mill, ran into Target looking for Superman water sandals (no luck), and dashed into Giant for a weekly Supermarket shop, and made it back home to pick up Nate by 3:15 for a 3:30 movie.

Luckily the theater is just a few blocks from my house. We got our tickets and qeued for popcorn along with 20 other preschool boys and their moms. We waited in line for about 12 minutes for popcorn then finally got to our seats missing the previews. We sat through about 6 minutes of the movie when Nate announced it was too scary and he wanted to leave.

I had one of those "aaaarrrggh" moments. Did I really just bust my ass getting errands done so I could treat you to a movie only to get rejected. I also was not sure, was he really scared, or just acting contrary? I questioned him gently. No, he was emphatic. "Let's go home!"

So we left. The manager was nice and refunded the movie tix to my credit card and we went home and played in the backyard. No pressure to Nate, just a compliment for being smart enough to leave if he was scared.

Lesson learned:
1) Don't get Nate movie coupons for his birthday
2) AMC kid packs come with jolly ranchers not M&MS, so bring your own.

Goldfish Countdown

There is now only 1 goldfish left. Keep your fingers crossed that he survives.

Fluidity theory- Do NOT read if you are squeamish

So I have a theory that parenting is all about fluid, bodily fluids in particular. It all begins with a little semen, then moves onto a lot of pee and tears during pregnancy, which translates into a lot of water and blood in the delivery. Once your angel is here, you are drowning in tears (yours & the baby's), liquidy poop and spit-up. Oh, and don't forget milk, all over your shirt if you are breast feeding; all over your hands and counters if you're not. Then as your child gets older, you lose the spit-up and the milk, but gain juice everywhere and urine during potty training. You also get some blood as the child grows more daring and active.

I bring this up, because yesterday, I had a bodily fluid day. In fact, I am still cleaning it all up. Jacob, my darling little constipated boy decided to make up for lost time, or rather, dirty diapers. During dinner he had a large liquidy poop that some might label diahrrea (sp?). I waited till after doing the dishes to clean up and allowed him to air dry since he has never gone poop more than 1 every 2 days or so. Silly me. Rookie mistake number 1.

I ran upstairs for a moment to turn on the bath water and when I came downstairs, Jacob was sitting on the steps announcing "sit!" He looked so cute I picked him up and hugged him before I noticed the poop running all over his legs, on the stairs and now all over my chest and arms. Yuck, but wait, it gets worse. Carrying Jacob as far away from my body as possible, I rushed him upstairs to clean him off. While doing this, Nate came running in to tell me the bath was overflowing. He was overstated his case, but it did not stop me from racing in there.

I then brought Jacob back downstairs asking him to show me where he had pooped. I armed myself with a roll of paper towels and heavy duty carpet cleaner spray. He brought me to the stairs and touched the stain on the carpet. I wiped off his hands and sprayed, then he brought me to the next site.

There must be some law like Boyles or Newtons regarding toddlers and poop. It must go something like, "when looking for a place to poop other then in the diaper, toddlers will always aim for a carpet or material that is difficult to wipe down." So obviously, of the 10% of my house that is covered in rugs, Jacob picked the most expensive and had diarreah all over it. Then to make matters worse, he stepped full into it.

Poor little guy, he just looked down and began to sob. I think the full humilation of stepping into your own shit impacted him. He knew it was hard to sink lower than that. I wiped him down with a paper towel, swiped at the carpet then carried him upstairs and threw him in the tub, which was thankfully full.

Finally after the boys were sleeping, I jumped into my own shower and triple-scrubbed myself.

MOMO!!!

We did it! We have been talking for months about it, and we finally did it. We got a pet. Well, make that 5 pets, now down to 3. What kind of pet you may ask. Why goldfish of course!

My husband took Nate to a carnival supposedly to introduce him to rides and games. I think Matt really just wanted some fried dough and cotton candy. So they went and they ate junk food and they played games, and they won all the usual carnival junk, including a goldfish.

Obviously the goldfish came homeless with no worldy posessions other than his plastic bag and dirty water. After the boys went to bed, my husband and I placed our bets on how long the goldfish would last. Matt won the bet with his money on "dead by morning." I optimistically gave him 2 days.

With such forecasts, Matt drove out to Petco at 9:00 pm to buy a small tank and extra fish and fish food. He came home armed with a teeny tank and some friends for the carney fish dubbed Nemo by my boys. (or Momo, by the baby who can't say Nemo).

It was so fun to see their faces light up in the morning when they saw the tank with 3 fish swimming around. Sadly, byt lunchtime Nemo and one other were dead. Nate took it well. (See previous posts on talking death with Nate). Matt once again set out for Pet-co and came home with a much larger tank and 2 more fish.

It is now bedtime, and I am hopeful we will not have to talk about death again tomorrow.

Hee hee hee

Funny things the boys said today that keep me smiling:

Nate: (imitating a pirate) "AAAARRGH Ladies!"

Nate: "What's the news Bubbie? I'm listening."

Nate: "Let's not call Jacob Toasters anymore, let's call him Chocolate Jacob!"

Jacob: "Chocket, chocket!"

Linda: "New rule! All bathroom doors, must remain shut since Jacob is now sticking his body in the toilet."
Nate: (2 hours later) "New rule! No Driving into other cars! All in favor, raise your hands! New Rule! No driving on the sidewalk!"
Jacob: "nooo nool! noo nool!"

Responsibility part deux

It occured to me that I sounded sanctimonious about responsibility and how great I am for not getting drunk or putting on my iPod too loudly. Let me share some dirty little (and not so little secrets):

1) I have no Will- if something were to happen to me & my husband, it's a toss-up as to who gets the boys and what money they will have.

2) I have no life insurance and neither does my husband (this is not actually our fault, as we have applied several times and were refused based on a minor heart condition)

3) I have no emergency provisions packed despite living less than a mile from the White House, Capitol and NORAD back-up site.

4) I have no house alarm despite 5 robberies, 1 murder and 3 escaped mental patients occuring on my street, and my husband travels about 2 weeks of every month. (if you are a person with evil intent, let me assure you, I do have a black belt in karate and a raging case of herpes**)

I am sure there are other horrible things that I am irresponsible about, but those are the biggies that come to mind easily. Yikes! I am making it a goal to get those resolved, cause I do often wake up in a cold-sweat, panicking.

And speaking of that kind of responsibility and loss of freedom, there was a HORRIBLE story in the news yesterday about a father who threw his children off a 15 story balcony then jumped himself. It is hard for me to formulate complete thoughts and sentences about this. I get physically nauseated even thinking about it. Obviously something triggered a breakdown in this man to be able to hurt his children in this way.

To me, it seems suicide is the ultimate cop-out on responsibility if you are a parent. In some ways I understand though and can see it as a medical issue. Some people can die of cancer or heart attack, and some die of suicide caused by a mental disease. It is hard for me though to see murder of your children in this light. My heart just goes out to this mom; how does one ever recover from something like this. I know she never will, but how does one even get up and out of bed in the morning?

OK, now I am sad, and I promise something more lighthearted next time.


**I will send stickers to anyone who can name the movie that quote is stolen from.

Freedom

Two nights ago I laid down in bed with my iPod on, earplugs in. My boys were barely sleeping, but I needed to rest my eyes after Lasik. I didn't turn my music up very loud. It was not a nod to any fear of noise-induced deafness, but a sense of responsibility to my children that kept the volume low.

I realized that in the three plus years since becoming a mom, I don't ever just let go anymore. I don't turn my music on full-blast. I don't get rip-roaring drunk anymore (mainly due to a fear of dealing with 2 toddlers and a hangover). In fact, nearly everything I do is with one ear, eye or brain cell in tune with my kids.

It is hard to just let it all go, knowing that 2 little people are depending on you. If I turn my music on too loud, I may miss a cry for help after a nightmare. If I get silly drunk, I may have impaired judgement in the unlikely event one of the boys wakes up and needs me in the middle of the night for something more critical than a hug.

I think this is truly the loss of freedom that scares couples discussing the possibility of having kids. Sure there are the mentions of the little superficial things like movies, dinner dates, travel, sports cars etc..., but it is the more subtle loss of freedom that is much more profound in my book and it is also not quite understood until you are a parent.

You can hire a babysitter and go out for dinner for an hour or two, but you can't ever go back to being the person you were before parenthood. I am and always will be (at least legally for the next 15 and 17 years) responsible for two other lives.

Auto Reply: Out of Office

I am getting Lasik tomorrow, so it may be a few days before I am up to staring at the screen and typing. Check in later!

Did I say that out loud?

I was at the pediatrician this afternoon getting my baby checked for strep or an ear infection. Just a bronchial infection that 10 days of antibiotics should clear up. I always find the waiting room at the pediatrician interesting for people watching, because parents tend to be on their hyper-vigilant behavior.

Today for example, a mom left the bill-paying counter to snap at her two sons who were engaged in a very minor dispute, "let go of each other now or we will get in the car and go home now!" Uhm, Mom, hate to break it to you, but you're at the doctor's. Your boys want to go home!

Don't think that I am criticizng the mom though. She was simply caught in an "oops, did I say that out loud" moment. We all have them. On days when I don't get enough sleep, I find myself babbling idle threats to the boys about losing pajamas or toys or park days. I eventually shut up when Nate's eyes glaze over and he treats me like white noise.

Positive discipline is all about words that count and have meaning that your children believe. I think, and this is a total generalization, that husbands are very guilty of the bad, idle threats. I know my husband can get so frustrated after a build-up of misbehavior, and blurt out ridiculous consequences. They are such poor choices, I usually end up lauging. Come on sweetie, are you really going to remove his shoes and make him walk barefoot forever? Or, never ever read him a bedtime story again.?

It is so hard when you are caught in the heat of the moment not to shout out the first punishment that comes to mind, but worth it when you come up with the right, logical consequence and you can positively modify behavior.

What are some of the worst/ridiculous things you have said aloud to your kids while disicplining them?

Thanks for the memories...

My son brought home a portfolio last week from school holding several pieces of his artwork. Apparently he is not as prolific at school as he is at home, as there were only 3 pieces of art from the entire year. At home he goes through 3 pieces of paper in a minute.

I never know which art and projects to keep. Should I keep the ones that look the best or the ones with holiday meaning , like a Passover seder plate? Or, should I keep just the ones that mark milestones, like the paper that has nothing on it but three Ns, marking the first time he started to write his name?

So far, I have kept most of the art, but in a cleaning frenzy last year, I threw 99% of it away. I find though that it is not the art that I want to hold onto but the special and silly moments that happen and are gone before you can mark them. For example, my 3 year old is obsessed at the moment with his little brother's cheeks. He keeps kissing & poking them saying, "I can't help it, he has the cheekiest cheeks."

It drives the baby bonkers, but I just want to keep hearing Nate's voice saying "cheekiest cheeks!" Or this morning, when he came into our room for our AM wakeup call, he bypassed my side of the bed; went straight for Matt and said, "Daddy wake up. It's Mommy's day off. It's Mother's Day." It happened too quickly to get a camcorder out, and it won't resonate as nicely in his baby book.

It is these memories and moments that don't fit into a portfolio but hold so much meaning for me, because they come and go so quickly.

OMG it's a MEME

Anyone new to blogging may not know that a meme is a silly thing bloggers do that is reminiscent of a questionaire / survey we did we were tweens. (not that we were called tweens way back when). Anyway, here goes a MEME with a DC slant. The idea is that you fill it out too.

Number of Kids: 2
Gender of kids: boys
Ages: 3 1/2 & 1 1/2
SAHM/WFT/WPT: WPT (does blogging count?)
Fave clothing store for play clothes: Children's Place, Target
Fave clothing store for dressy: Janie & Jack, Full of Beans
Which Whole Foods: Tenleytown
Toy Store: Childs Play or Whirligigs & Whimsys in Wyldwood shopping center
Library: Chevy Chase or New Bethesda Arlington Rd.
Park: Chesapeake (they have 3 backhoes in the sandbox), I like Macomb too.
Museum: National Building Museum
Monument: Korean
Best zoo moment: watching orangutans on the O line, picnicking in the rest area of the Lions den with the Lion roaring at us
Favorite kid friendly restaurant- Matuba all u can eat kaitan sushi bar on Sunday nights, then Ben & Jerry's after. Or Kotobuki in the Palisades for $1/piece sushi (no high chairs though)
Rainy Day activity: library, Montgomery Mall, Ikea
Best Class with kid: Musikids or Silverstars with Coach Mark
Favorite Trail for hiking/biking: Roosevelt island or Rock Creek park leading into zoo


Ok, that's it. Lame, I know. I promise never to indulge again.

Houston, we have a p-r-o-b-l-e-m

I used to be a teacher. I hated it, but I loved teaching reading. I adore children's books in general and am thrilled to have an excuse to hangout in the children's section of the library now that I have kids. I have also been conducting a pseudo experiment with my three-year old. Before he was born, I wondered if I could teach him to read at an early age. I set rules for myself though. I would not use any high-pressure tactics, do any phonics drills and I would instill a love of reading as well as the ability to read.

So here's the kicker...it's working. Through a variety of techniques, which I will document in a book I am planning on writing (someday), my 3 1/2 year old is reading several words, writing several words, loving to read, and generally demonstrating a keen understanding of literacy.

The problem is that his understanding of the alphabet is leading to a problem for Matt and me. I know this happens to all of us eventually but it has hit full-force this week. We can't spell out secrets to each other anymore. For example, if I ask Matt, "What are you thinking for dinner? How does s-u-s-h-i sound?" Nate immediatly jumps in with, "YES!!! I want sushi! SUSHI!!!!!"

I know lots of kids do this based on memorization, but Nate is putting the letter sounds together when we spell & making very reasonable guesses. So now Matt & I need a new language to use in front of the kids. Unfortunately, he took high school French & I hablo espanol. You may see us at a Berlitz soon.

Flying the friendly skies

I am almost too exhausted to write this, but I will give it the old college try. About 2 hours ago, my family arrived back in our house after 6 weeks on the road. Yep, you read that correctly. Our itinerary looked something like this:

March 3-5 NYC (airplane, taxi)
March 24-27 Miami (Plane)
April 1-3 BF New Jersey (Road Trip- flat tire in Delaware!)
April 14 - 25 Miami (plane)
April 27 - 29 Miami (Metro, Marc Train, Plane, rental car)
May 6-8 Atlanta (plane, rental car)

That is a lot of travel for any road warrior, now keep in mind, we did all of that with a 1 & 3 year old! Why so many trips you may ask. Well, all of our family and friends decided to get married. There was not an event we could reasonably skip and no family to leave the kids with, so they came along, and along, and along. Though, my travels aren't the point, traveling with kids in general is.

Airline Travel: Getting through security can be a nightmare. Everyone has their tales of TSA incompetence and confusion. For the most part, I have found the TSA agents to be very nice and helpful when traveling with kids. They always give high-fives to the boys after they pass through the detector. They are patient as we take 10 minutes to disassemble our stroller, carseat, 2 backpacks, laptop bag, insulated lunch bag, pockets full of change, shoes, and coats. On a few memorable occasions, awesome agents have helped carry all of our stuff to another table so we could reassemble our gear. However, despite the assistance, it is very dificult to disassemble all the gear with 2 children, mainly due to the 40 Lb car seat. which leads me to my main point.

We would not bring a car seat at all if not for the incredibly stupid airline rules about baby seating. It makes NO sense to me that EVERYONE on the plane MUST keep seatbelts fastened at all times, unless you are under 2, in which case, feel free to bounce around the cabin. We always spend the money to buy a seat for our baby. First of all, it is a safety issue, secondly it is a comfort issue. How can anyone sit on a place for more than 40 minutes with 25 wriggling pounds and hands grabbing at hair, glasses, water glasses etc... So we make the effort to lug the car seat through the airport and onto the plane.

Once my older son turned two, we stopped bringing the car seat & just buckled him in. This is where I really find fault with the airlines. If my son were 5"10", 300 Lbs, the flight attendants would hasten to bring him a seatbelt extender. However he is 3'6", 35Lbs and they come over to chastise and make sure his seatbelt is fastened. The answer is yes, it is fastened, but he is so skinny, it just slips right off. Why can't they design a 5-point harness, or seatbelt reducer, or allow booster seats on the plane?

I am debating internally whether to start a campaign much like the ADA compliance act, except for children and little persons. Restrooms, with more than 3 toilets must make 1 of them low enough for a child to reach and provide a stepstool for hand washing at the sinks. Public transportation should have some available seatbelts. Airlines should have safe seating for people of ALL sizes. TIVO should be required in every household. Wait, that is from a different wish list. Seriously though, what bothers you when traveling either around town or farther a field with your little ones?

The dreaded conversation

One of those dreaded moments came a few days ago. My beloved Grandma died. She had been sick for a short time, and in true Bobbie fashion, she went out in her own way, refusing to linger in a sick bed.

Her death meant that we had to face the decision of telling our 3 year old son that his Great-grandmother had died. He was only 22 months when his other great-grandmother died, so we never bothered telling him. We figured he would never ask, but he had a real relationship with Bobbie and had spent the previous week playing in her apartment with her.

I consulted the director at his preschool who gave us a packet of reading and ideas for ways to have the conversation. We discussed putting it off till I was feeling less grief, but I felt it was important to tell him right away. (no idea why)

We figured the conversation would go something like this:

"Nate, we have sad news to tell you."
"What?"
"Remember how Grandma Bobbie went to the hospital because she was sick? Well, the doctors did everything they could to help her, but her body was very sick and her heart stopped working and she died."
"Oh, can we visit her? Where is she? in our backyard? Linny the Wonderpet is a hamster."

That was pretty much how it went, except he focused on it a bit more than expected and asked us to repeat the sad story. Then he told us a Superman story instead of a Wonderpets moment. He saw that I cried as I told him, but it didn't seem to scare him; it just attached a bit more importance to the news I think.

Later in the day, he wanted to hear the sad news again. We told him again, and that we could always remember Bobbie by thinking of a something we had done with her or looking at a picture of her. He then requested to watch our wedding video to see her and wanted drawing paper to draw a picture of her. He did an amazing job on the picture and even captured her earrings that she was never without.

It has been a week since she died and 2 days since we told Nate, and I miss her terribly, but my grief has been eased by being so busy with the boys, I can't stop to focus. But, I dont feel like I am missing a grieving process, because I am sharing with Nate. Just today, he and I baked banana bread, and I told him that Bobbie was the person who taught me how to bake. He replied, "Now we remember her in our minds!"

Sophie Buckman and Cooper Banks-Mackenzie

My mom and I were chatting tonight and we got into the conversation about what my children call different adults. I realized that I nearly always introduce my children to other adult's by their first names. All of my friends children call me Linda. I can't imagine being called Mrs. Heller. Nate calls all his friend's Moms by their first names.

I read somewhere that your childhood rules are usually the best indicator for whether you will be more formal or casual when it comes to children and adult names. Why then am I, who grew up calling all adults Mr. or Mrs. S0 & So, totally casual when it comes to kids calling me Linda or introducing adults by their first names to my children. To this day, I still call my parent's friends Mr. and Mrs., despite the fact that I have known many of them for more than 30 years and consider them as dear as family.

I could not come up with any strong reason, but then I realized that the majority of my friends do not share last names with their children. Most (keep in mind there is no scientific polling data behind this statement) women these days are getting married later into their professional careers, and do not take their husband's last name. So, when they have children, the children have their father's last name. In some cases, the child has a combination of last names of hyphenated.

It is hard enough to keep track of all the first names, let alone instruct Nate to "say hello to your friend Benjamin Schwartz and his mom, Mrs. Rosenstein." I think for clarity and sanity, we have made an unspoken pact to simplify by giving everyone only one name, their first.

What do you do among your circle of friends? First or last names? Do you prefer more formality.

To tell or not to tell

My husband and I have recently changed our philosophy on an important parenting issue. The question is, when hiring a babysitter for the night, do you tell your children you are leaving? Especially, if, like many parents, you put your children to bed before the babysitter even arrives.

If all goes according to plan, your child will sleep; the babysitter will surf your TIVO, and your child will wake you up in the morning as usual without ever knowing you left. My husband and I always used to go this route. However, recently we have changed tacks due to a lingering fear of mine in which Nate wakes up, discovers we're gone and loses all trust in me. (Somehow I always get blamed for these types of incidents. i.e. Daddy goes away on business, I get the brunt of anger.)

We have decided in the last six months that it is better to deal with the 20 minute sulks that come when he is told a babysitter is coming. We have even been so daring to allow the babysitter to put the boys to bed and we can catch dinner AND a movie. By putting the boys to bed ourselves, we only had time for one amusement.

I know several close friends are still going with the T.S.P choice of tucking in, sneaking out, and praying to god the children stay sleeping. I would highly recommend the Jerry Spring method of bare all, tell all. Deal with the whining for a few minutes. I just know my child would never sleep alone in his bedroom again if he were to wake up with us gone and a babysitter in our place.

The other trick we have been doing lately is not requiring bed. The boys are usually willing to play with a strange person for a while but have anxiety about a stranger tucking them into bed. On the few occasions when we have traveled for weddings and had to have hotel babysitters, we just told Nate that he did not have to go to bed. He could wait up for us, but he had to put his pajamas on, and he could sit in our bed and wait for us. Sure enough, within 20-30 minutes of his usual bedtime, he would simply pass out in our bed and we carried him to his bed when we returned home from the event.

How do you all handle babysitter issues. Do you tell and leave or tuck and pray?

teed- off

I actually wrote a really long and decent post last night, but did not have time to finish it so I saved it as a draft. Somehow, it is missing. I am so bummed I cant think about rewriting it yet, so I will go eat some chocolate instead.

I'm Lovin' it!

So we had a first tonight. We have made it 3 1/2 years without introducing our children to the iconographic American institution that is the Golden Arches, more specifically, the drive-through, and it had been at least 3 more before that since Matt & I had entered a McDonalds.

Now, don't get me wrong, I am not an organic, homemade babyfood type of gal. Just this morning, Nate & I split a bag of jelly beans, then licked the bowl of brownie batter. But, we keep kosher so most of the major fast-food chains hold no appeal for us since there is nothing we can eat on the menu. (one exception is Subway, which is a frequent destination for us)

However, tonight, Nate picked a chocolate milkshake for his dessert treat. We were out in Kensington, so I suggested we just swing into MickeyD's for the shake. It just did not occur to Matt & me, until it was happening, that we had just introduced both our boys to the world of fast food.

First we pulled into the 24 hour drive through where we sat like idiots not knowing which speaker to place our order into. Nate was highly curious about this process,

"Is this our parking space?"

Then we pulled around to pay.

"Do we go in now Daddy?"

After paying Matt pulled forward to the next window, then we panicked. Who would deliver the food; had we erroneously pulled up?

"Where's my chocolate milk shake daddy?!?!"

They must have felt the bewilderment coming out of the car since someone came over to reassure us that shakes would be arriving shortly. Speaking of short, when the children's shake arrived it was not small- it was at least 10 oz.

Both boys grasped their cups contentedly and sat back safely beneath their 5 point harnesses and sipped at the sickly sweet concoction, that legally is just called a shake, cause it has no milk. Nate examined his cup.

"Who's this guy?"

"That's Ronald McDonald."

"Who's that"

"uuuuhhhh, a clown. How's your shake?"

I am now officially panicked that the boys will recognize the golden arches and I will have screaming fits begging for milk shakes when I drive by. Then it will only be a matter of time before they notice the menu outside has pictures of chicken nuggets and fries AND toys, usually from their favorite movies. Oy, I guess I am finding an alternative route to River Road, the only McDonalds we regularly drive by.