When I got ready to drive my kids to school this morning there was snow covering our deck and our yard. It was 33 degrees outside. And yet The Youngest Boy was dressed in shorts, a T-shirt and a light nylon zip-up sweatshirt.
“Are you serious?” I asked. “No. No shorts. There’s snow outside!”
He started to offer a counter-argument but I cut him off.
“No! Put on pants! Now!”
As I donned my boots and my red winter jacket -- which has already gotten use this season when I'm inside those meat lockers that they call youth hockey rinks, I noticed that The Youngest Boy had indeed changed into track pants yet was heading toward the garage without a jacket.
“Get a coat!”
“But . . .”
“GET A COAT! There’s SNOW outside!”
He slung his hockey jacket over his arm and then took a seat in the vehicle.
“Put the coat on,” I said, calmer than I'd been a few minutes prior. I put on the breaks and idled in the driveway waiting for him to don the coat.
Flash-forward several hours later: When The Youngest Boy entered the house after school he wasn’t wearing the jacket and was wearing shorts. His track pants were rendered into a crumpled up ball inside his backpack. He swore that he just changed into the shorts at the end of the day, before gym class.
Color me skeptical.
Showing posts with label kids and coats. Show all posts
Showing posts with label kids and coats. Show all posts
Friday, October 28, 2011
Tuesday, June 21, 2011
Short Dispatches from the Nut House
Bands, Bands . . . Everywhere are Bands
The Youngest Boy had his first concert with his school band last week. He played the xylophone, rather unenthusiastically I might add. After years of attending his older brother’s school band concerts – The Eldest Boy plays the drums and other percussion instruments – we thought that The Youngest Boy would feel proud to perform in his own while his family watched from the audience. In reality, all he was sincerely focused on was whether I’d take the kids out for ice cream afterwards because The Eldest Boy and his buds went out for ice cream after their concert the week prior.
Speaking of bands . . . The Eldest Boy has become so enamored of drumming and jazz (an affinity inspired by his awesome band teacher) that, for his middle school biography project he read a book about famed drummer Buddy Rich, a contemporary of Frank Sinatra. After reading the Rich bio, the 12-year-old sounds like a member of the Greatest Generation as he frequently drops references to Tommy Dorsey, Artie Shaw, the Chairman of the Board and Mel Torme.
I See Exit Signs and Naked People
What, pray tell, was the highlight of a recent trip to the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston with the Picket Fence Post family? If you asked The Youngest Boy he'd tell you it would be seeing what he called “the glorious exit sign.” And then all of us using it. He was no fan of the new Art of the Americas wing because he said it contained too much furniture for his taste. (“Chairs are not art!” exclaimed the 9-year-old critic.)
Meanwhile all three kids were disturbed by the multitude of naked people depicted in paintings and in sculptures throughout the museum. No matter how The Spouse and I tried to tell them that the human body is considered beautiful, they scoffed. Apparently The Spouse and I were sick for saying so. And not "sick" in that good, “cool” way.
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It’s All Black & Gold
The Spouse took The Youngest Boy to the parade in Boston on Saturday celebrating the Stanley Cup winning Boston Bruins. I took a pass on the parade as The Girl, The Eldest Boy and I had vital Father’s Day stuff to accomplish. However the three of us did watch the festivities on TV. Three separate TVs in fact. The Spouse had texted us to tell us where on the parade route they were so that we could text them back with updates about where the team was and approximately how long it would take before they arrived at their location.
But back to the TVs . . . The Girl, The Eldest Boy and I were under the delusion that we’d be able to spot our loved ones on TV so we each took up a position watching a different local stations' coverage of the parade to see if we could see them. Yeah, with a million+ people in attendance, of course we’d see The Spouse and The Youngest Boy.
Photographic Evidence
The three kiddos just brought home their school yearbooks and, while perusing one of them this afternoon I stumbled across photographic evidence that The Youngest Boy blew off my attempts to keep him warm during the winter. (This is the kid who gave me grief when I wouldn't let him wear shorts to school in freezing temperatures.) In one group photo taken on the playground, where snow is heaped all over the place, there’s The Youngest Boy, in sweatpants and a short sleeve T-shirt surrounded by his buddies who were wearing winter coats and winter hats. Something is definitely wrong with this picture.
The Youngest Boy had his first concert with his school band last week. He played the xylophone, rather unenthusiastically I might add. After years of attending his older brother’s school band concerts – The Eldest Boy plays the drums and other percussion instruments – we thought that The Youngest Boy would feel proud to perform in his own while his family watched from the audience. In reality, all he was sincerely focused on was whether I’d take the kids out for ice cream afterwards because The Eldest Boy and his buds went out for ice cream after their concert the week prior.
Speaking of bands . . . The Eldest Boy has become so enamored of drumming and jazz (an affinity inspired by his awesome band teacher) that, for his middle school biography project he read a book about famed drummer Buddy Rich, a contemporary of Frank Sinatra. After reading the Rich bio, the 12-year-old sounds like a member of the Greatest Generation as he frequently drops references to Tommy Dorsey, Artie Shaw, the Chairman of the Board and Mel Torme.
I See Exit Signs and Naked People
What, pray tell, was the highlight of a recent trip to the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston with the Picket Fence Post family? If you asked The Youngest Boy he'd tell you it would be seeing what he called “the glorious exit sign.” And then all of us using it. He was no fan of the new Art of the Americas wing because he said it contained too much furniture for his taste. (“Chairs are not art!” exclaimed the 9-year-old critic.)
Meanwhile all three kids were disturbed by the multitude of naked people depicted in paintings and in sculptures throughout the museum. No matter how The Spouse and I tried to tell them that the human body is considered beautiful, they scoffed. Apparently The Spouse and I were sick for saying so. And not "sick" in that good, “cool” way.
The Spouse took The Youngest Boy to the parade in Boston on Saturday celebrating the Stanley Cup winning Boston Bruins. I took a pass on the parade as The Girl, The Eldest Boy and I had vital Father’s Day stuff to accomplish. However the three of us did watch the festivities on TV. Three separate TVs in fact. The Spouse had texted us to tell us where on the parade route they were so that we could text them back with updates about where the team was and approximately how long it would take before they arrived at their location.
But back to the TVs . . . The Girl, The Eldest Boy and I were under the delusion that we’d be able to spot our loved ones on TV so we each took up a position watching a different local stations' coverage of the parade to see if we could see them. Yeah, with a million+ people in attendance, of course we’d see The Spouse and The Youngest Boy.
Photographic Evidence
The three kiddos just brought home their school yearbooks and, while perusing one of them this afternoon I stumbled across photographic evidence that The Youngest Boy blew off my attempts to keep him warm during the winter. (This is the kid who gave me grief when I wouldn't let him wear shorts to school in freezing temperatures.) In one group photo taken on the playground, where snow is heaped all over the place, there’s The Youngest Boy, in sweatpants and a short sleeve T-shirt surrounded by his buddies who were wearing winter coats and winter hats. Something is definitely wrong with this picture.
Monday, March 14, 2011
Picket Fence Post Blogger Now Back & Ready to Go (Without the Benefit of Adonis DNA)
I may not have one gear, Go!, as father of the year Charlie Sheen does, but I’m ready to return to this blogging goodness here after my brief break. Having finished editing my top secret manuscript (if I have any news about it, of the good variety, believe me, I’ll share), I’m back to business.
So, what, other than Charlie Sheen’s antics, the liberation of Egypt, the riots in Libya and the ongoing horrors in Japan has been going on during the time I was gone? Well, I’ll keep my summary very basic and very local, focusing on the various oddities and events from the Picket Fence Post household:
As a trio of screenless iPod Shuffles did a few years ago, The Girl’s iPod Nano, which has a screen and is much more expensive than a Shuffle, went through the washer AND the dryer after I, a mother whom me children think is mad with power, insisted that she pick up all the clothing that was on her bedroom floor and put it either in the laundry or in a drawer (NOT under her bed). The Girl angrily put almost all the clothing in the laundry, no one checked the pockets and . . . voila . . . iPod through the new washer and dryer. Thus far *knock on wood* it is still working. We shall see.
***
***
The Girl amazed me with her bravery when she and a pal performed a song from the Nickelodeon show Victorious at the recent middle school talent show. They did not look scared at all, as they took to the stage in front of a couple hundred people. In fact, they had giant smiles on their face as they bopped around stage dancing and singing. *so proud*
***
So, what, other than Charlie Sheen’s antics, the liberation of Egypt, the riots in Libya and the ongoing horrors in Japan has been going on during the time I was gone? Well, I’ll keep my summary very basic and very local, focusing on the various oddities and events from the Picket Fence Post household:
As a trio of screenless iPod Shuffles did a few years ago, The Girl’s iPod Nano, which has a screen and is much more expensive than a Shuffle, went through the washer AND the dryer after I, a mother whom me children think is mad with power, insisted that she pick up all the clothing that was on her bedroom floor and put it either in the laundry or in a drawer (NOT under her bed). The Girl angrily put almost all the clothing in the laundry, no one checked the pockets and . . . voila . . . iPod through the new washer and dryer. Thus far *knock on wood* it is still working. We shall see.
***
It may be March, but the temperatures are still in the 30s and 40s. Not shorts weather, unless you happen to be a 9-year-old boy who knows EVERYTHING and you, the aforementioned power-mad mother know absolutely nothing about what it’s like to be a kid. Nearly every day last week (and even this morning) I had to order The Youngest Boy to take off the shorts he was wearing (along with a T-shirt) and put on pants before going to school. And yet he still donned shorts when he came home from school telling me how very hot it was outside.
***
. . . You want irony? That same kid mentioned in the previous anecdote, the one who thinks 35 degrees is balmy enough for sports shorts and a T-shirt, turned the thermostat up to 81 the other night while I was making dinner. I’d become worried that I was getting sick or that I was having hot flashes (!) or something as I made dinner one night last week. By the time I’d cleaned up all the dishes and retired to the family room to read a magazine, I was literally sweating.
“Is it hot in here, or is it me?” I asked The Eldest Boy, who reported that he felt hot too. It was he who checked the temperature and reported that his brother had jacked the furnace up to a tropical 81. Maybe if the kid wasn’t wearing shorts then he wouldn’t need the heat so high. I’m just sayin’ . . .
***
Showering + Children = Complaining, oh the bitter complaining.
Dirty Finger Nails + Son = Complaining that Mom wants everything “perfect” when she tells him to wash his hands and clean under his fingernails.***
The Girl amazed me with her bravery when she and a pal performed a song from the Nickelodeon show Victorious at the recent middle school talent show. They did not look scared at all, as they took to the stage in front of a couple hundred people. In fact, they had giant smiles on their face as they bopped around stage dancing and singing. *so proud*
***
Do not take your kids to see Gnomeo & Juliet. You will not be able to get your 84 minutes back. And by the time you get to the end, you’ll be quite angry about that, trust me.
Tuesday, January 4, 2011
Bizarre Parenting News Stories from the Past 10 Days: Killer Coffee Tables, No Coats & Minivans are ‘Cool’?
While I was laying in bed over the past week recovering from the (swine?) flu, I came across a series of bizarre parenting stories that I feel compelled to share with you, my kind readers:
Killer Coffee Tables
Who knew that coffee tables were killers, lying in wait in living rooms and family rooms across America. Seriously. The New York Times dedicated a huge chunk of the front page of its Home section to the notion that for babies and toddlers who are learning to walk, coffee tables are a hazardous menace.
When my kids were learning to walk and started scaling furniture, The Spouse and I temporarily removed the coffee table from our living room until the kids were stable walkers and no longer climbed on top of furniture. No biggie. No expert warnings were necessary for us to figure out what we needed to do. When we brought the young ones to other people’s homes in which there were coffee tables, either The Spouse or I would bey at our toddler’s side watching them and removing stuff like crystal candy dishes or open candle flames from their reach. We used common sense until the kids were older.
Did this mean that our children were protected from never banging their heads and getting goose eggs? Absolutely not. Life's hard and bumpy and there's nothing we could do about it.
The Youngest Boy once walked straight into a pole at a grocery store when he was 3 years old, leading with his forehead, and he sustained a huge, ugly bump which, for some reason, he named “Edward.” One day The Girl was dancing in the family room and accidentally kicked her twin brother in the face; he got a big bruise on his head. When The Eldest Boy was a toddler who’d mastered the art of climbing stairs, he tripped down the three stairs leading to our front breezeway in our old house, landing on his head. (I was videotaping him at the time too.)
"Do not be fooled. The coffee table means your children harm. And when it attacks, results can be ugly.
Last year, 143,070 children age 5 and younger visited emergency rooms after table accidents, according to estimates from the United States Consumer Product Safety Commission. Coffee tables, in particular, turn up in more than a quarter of the accident reports, in the commission’s sample count."
My question: Why single out the coffee table as the chief menace to toddlers’ heads? When babies and toddlers interact with the world, they’re going to fall, no matter how much you don’t want them to, or how much you want to prevent it. That's life. Sending new parents into a frenzy and making them fearful of furniture -- I remember experts terrifying me about almost everything in my home when my twins were small – seems unnecessarily over the top.
No Coats
When I drove my kids to school this morning – The Youngest Boy had to be there early for school band practice – the temperature on my dashboard read 21 degrees.
I was bundled up in fuzzy boots, a warm winter coat, a cap, a long scarf wrapped around my neck and toasty leather gloves. And I was in the heated car absolutely loving the perk of heated seats. (They bring me an unreasonable degree of joy.)
As I dropped off The Youngest Boy at his school then drove The Girl and The Eldest Boy to their middle school, I noticed kid after kid – all boys – in shorts and many of them without coats.
This, sadly, did not shock me. I spent most of the fall arguing with my 9-year-old son over the fact that he’d fallen in with kids who insist on wearing shorts and no wearing coats when low temperature clearly call for outerwear and long pants. The principal of his school has sent numerous e-mails to us parents, pleading with us to please make sure our children are dressed for the weather. Yet even when I showed these e-mails to my son hoping that perhaps the admonitions of his principal would prove persuasive, I'd still get into an argument with him on many a morning about the fact that, regardless of his street cred, I was irrationally making him wear a coat. And yes, I was aware that he removed the coat the moment he thought he was out of eye shot.
So it was with interest that I read this Associated Press story by Beth Harpaz about the phenomenon of young people who reject winter coats and, in some cases, opt for shorts during cold weather. Harpaz’s story began:
“Among the great spectacles of winter, along with the northern lights and frozen lakes, are coatless kids.
No coat, no gloves? No prob!
These teens and tweens are chillin’ out, literally and figuratively, in their sweatshirts and kicks. Maybe a boy will accessorize with a baseball cap, and a girl might choose stylish boots – but nothing weatherproof, please! Some boys even wear shorts year-round, and many parents say they’ve given up the fight.”
The bottom line of the article: If you live in Alaska and frostbite is a real possibility, you probably should make the kids wear appropriate clothing. If not, an ER doctor told Harpaz that, "If teens are 'going off to school in 30 or 40 degree (above zero) weather with less than ideal coverings, they're probably okay, as long as they do not find themselves stuck outside for a long time at those temperatures.'" I'm going to choose NOT to share that particular quote with The Youngest Boy.
Minivans, Cool?
I once wrote a column about my reluctant journey from being a sedan-driving mom of two, to a minivan-driving mom of three kids under the age of 4. Though I knew that driving a minivan would designate me as a vanilla mom with a sub-zero hip factor, the minivan was a blessing in terms of affording my family space when we were out and about, giving me a safe, comfortable place to change my baby’s diapers and nurse him while my 3-year-old twins played. The stroller and other baby accouterments fit well in the back, even alongside bags and bags of groceries. However I was thrilled to ditch our minivan a few years ago when the Picket Fence Post family made the transition from a minivan family to an SUV family.
But I read with a skeptical eye, this piece in the New York Times which asserted that minivan makers are trying to market the family behemoths as the opposite of what they really are: Cool.
“In marketing campaigns featuring heavy-metal theme songs, rapping parents, secret agents in cat masks, pyrotechnics and even Godzilla, minivan makers are trying to recast the much-ridiculed mom-mobile as something that parents can be proud — or at least unashamed — of driving,” the Times reported. “Toyota led the effort early last spring with a campaign for its Sienna model that features a self-indulgent couple rapping about rolling through the cul-de-sacs with their posse of kids in their ‘Swagger Wagon.’”
Sorry, but I’m not buyin’ it. Are you?
Image credit: Andrea Levy/New York Times.
Who knew that coffee tables were killers, lying in wait in living rooms and family rooms across America. Seriously. The New York Times dedicated a huge chunk of the front page of its Home section to the notion that for babies and toddlers who are learning to walk, coffee tables are a hazardous menace.
When my kids were learning to walk and started scaling furniture, The Spouse and I temporarily removed the coffee table from our living room until the kids were stable walkers and no longer climbed on top of furniture. No biggie. No expert warnings were necessary for us to figure out what we needed to do. When we brought the young ones to other people’s homes in which there were coffee tables, either The Spouse or I would bey at our toddler’s side watching them and removing stuff like crystal candy dishes or open candle flames from their reach. We used common sense until the kids were older.
Did this mean that our children were protected from never banging their heads and getting goose eggs? Absolutely not. Life's hard and bumpy and there's nothing we could do about it.
The Youngest Boy once walked straight into a pole at a grocery store when he was 3 years old, leading with his forehead, and he sustained a huge, ugly bump which, for some reason, he named “Edward.” One day The Girl was dancing in the family room and accidentally kicked her twin brother in the face; he got a big bruise on his head. When The Eldest Boy was a toddler who’d mastered the art of climbing stairs, he tripped down the three stairs leading to our front breezeway in our old house, landing on his head. (I was videotaping him at the time too.)
"Do not be fooled. The coffee table means your children harm. And when it attacks, results can be ugly.
Last year, 143,070 children age 5 and younger visited emergency rooms after table accidents, according to estimates from the United States Consumer Product Safety Commission. Coffee tables, in particular, turn up in more than a quarter of the accident reports, in the commission’s sample count."
My question: Why single out the coffee table as the chief menace to toddlers’ heads? When babies and toddlers interact with the world, they’re going to fall, no matter how much you don’t want them to, or how much you want to prevent it. That's life. Sending new parents into a frenzy and making them fearful of furniture -- I remember experts terrifying me about almost everything in my home when my twins were small – seems unnecessarily over the top.
No Coats
When I drove my kids to school this morning – The Youngest Boy had to be there early for school band practice – the temperature on my dashboard read 21 degrees.
I was bundled up in fuzzy boots, a warm winter coat, a cap, a long scarf wrapped around my neck and toasty leather gloves. And I was in the heated car absolutely loving the perk of heated seats. (They bring me an unreasonable degree of joy.)
As I dropped off The Youngest Boy at his school then drove The Girl and The Eldest Boy to their middle school, I noticed kid after kid – all boys – in shorts and many of them without coats.
This, sadly, did not shock me. I spent most of the fall arguing with my 9-year-old son over the fact that he’d fallen in with kids who insist on wearing shorts and no wearing coats when low temperature clearly call for outerwear and long pants. The principal of his school has sent numerous e-mails to us parents, pleading with us to please make sure our children are dressed for the weather. Yet even when I showed these e-mails to my son hoping that perhaps the admonitions of his principal would prove persuasive, I'd still get into an argument with him on many a morning about the fact that, regardless of his street cred, I was irrationally making him wear a coat. And yes, I was aware that he removed the coat the moment he thought he was out of eye shot.
So it was with interest that I read this Associated Press story by Beth Harpaz about the phenomenon of young people who reject winter coats and, in some cases, opt for shorts during cold weather. Harpaz’s story began:
“Among the great spectacles of winter, along with the northern lights and frozen lakes, are coatless kids.
No coat, no gloves? No prob!
These teens and tweens are chillin’ out, literally and figuratively, in their sweatshirts and kicks. Maybe a boy will accessorize with a baseball cap, and a girl might choose stylish boots – but nothing weatherproof, please! Some boys even wear shorts year-round, and many parents say they’ve given up the fight.”
The bottom line of the article: If you live in Alaska and frostbite is a real possibility, you probably should make the kids wear appropriate clothing. If not, an ER doctor told Harpaz that, "If teens are 'going off to school in 30 or 40 degree (above zero) weather with less than ideal coverings, they're probably okay, as long as they do not find themselves stuck outside for a long time at those temperatures.'" I'm going to choose NOT to share that particular quote with The Youngest Boy.
Minivans, Cool?
I once wrote a column about my reluctant journey from being a sedan-driving mom of two, to a minivan-driving mom of three kids under the age of 4. Though I knew that driving a minivan would designate me as a vanilla mom with a sub-zero hip factor, the minivan was a blessing in terms of affording my family space when we were out and about, giving me a safe, comfortable place to change my baby’s diapers and nurse him while my 3-year-old twins played. The stroller and other baby accouterments fit well in the back, even alongside bags and bags of groceries. However I was thrilled to ditch our minivan a few years ago when the Picket Fence Post family made the transition from a minivan family to an SUV family.
But I read with a skeptical eye, this piece in the New York Times which asserted that minivan makers are trying to market the family behemoths as the opposite of what they really are: Cool.
“In marketing campaigns featuring heavy-metal theme songs, rapping parents, secret agents in cat masks, pyrotechnics and even Godzilla, minivan makers are trying to recast the much-ridiculed mom-mobile as something that parents can be proud — or at least unashamed — of driving,” the Times reported. “Toyota led the effort early last spring with a campaign for its Sienna model that features a self-indulgent couple rapping about rolling through the cul-de-sacs with their posse of kids in their ‘Swagger Wagon.’”
Sorry, but I’m not buyin’ it. Are you?
Image credit: Andrea Levy/New York Times.
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