Blog, stories

The "Toddler Effect"

Philmundo — Thu, 28 May 2009 06:47:06 -0700

by Phil Stott

Just last weekend I noticed-not for the first time-one of the major benefits to having a child of toddling age: getting away with stuff. For some reason, having a bundle of cuteness with me wherever I go seems to make people more amenable on those occasions that I get caught acting like a complete jerk-something that never quite seems to be as rare as I think it is, as my wife will surely attest.

The most recent example of the toddler effect happened, of all places, in my local library. Having finally returned a book that had been in my possession for almost two months, I was appalled to get a phone call a couple of weeks ago from said library alleging that the condition of the book had deteriorated so much in my care that I would have to pay them for it.

Being busy with work plus the fact that I really wasn't looking forward to the encounter, it took me a couple of weeks to get down there to sort the problem out. Being the kind of guy who likes to run through a million different scenarios of how a scene is likely to play out, the two weeks between the call and me presenting myself at the lending desk were filled with all manner of variations on the theme. Ideal scenario: I'd get some teenager who couldn't care less, and would just take the money. Worst case scenario: I'd get a stern lecture from some withered spinster (in my imagination only bored teenagers and sharp-eyed spinsters work in libraries) while other library-goers paused from browsing the stacks to look up and tut their disapproval. Even worse was the prospect that I'd hand over the money and have to argue over the fate of the book; in my estimation, paying for it meant that I should get to keep it, especially if its condition was such that they would rather call me in than lend it to someone else.

Having spent most of Saturday manfully trying to find ways to put off the encounter yet again (grocery shopping, getting a new tire, feigning an interest in college lacrosse on TV), I was eventually propelled towards my fate by my wife's insistence that she needed some peace and quiet to get on with her grad school work. Running through a mental checklist of Maeve-friendly errands that needed running (as opposed to Maeve-unfriendly ones like, uh, going to the driving range), I realized that there was no way I could put off the library encounter any longer. Packing her into the car, then, I headed off towards my fate, mentally rerunning both the best and worst case scenarios as I drove.

As it turned out, the encounter fell somewhere between the two extremes. In fact, thanks to Maeve, it ended up a lot closer to "best" on the scale than I had any right to expect. When I went in and announced myself, I was met with a frosty "Ah. Yes" by a distinctly matronly character, before she flounced off to grab the book as if I'd done her a personal injury. Returning with it, it wasn't difficult to see why-or how I'd thought the book was okay to return. It was a nightmare. A giant coffee stain, with grounds in it, adorned a significant cross section of the pages, and the cover was bent in half, the unbound edge pointing skywards at around the same angle as the screen currently sticking up from my laptop.

Fortunately, just at the point she brought it out, Maeve started fidgeting on the floor beside me, and I picked her up. The change in the woman when I set Maeve on the counter next to the offending book was a sight to behold. From stern and matronly, she morphed into a kindly grandmother right before my eyes. Not only did she forget what she was doing, when I reminded her she seemed distinctly sorry to have to be taking the money, and I left the place carrying not only the book (which was surrendered without question), but a much lighter load of guilt and shame than I'd expected.

Since then, a colleague told me she'd read something about how people with kids have been less likely to lose their jobs in the recession than childless people. I don't know how true that is, having seen couple of parents canned at my own office of late, but if it is, it's another example of the toddler effect in action. Regardless, it's something I'll be trying to harness in future-I could use all the help I can get at the office, whether it's in asking for a raise or (more likely) avoiding yet another round of layoffs.

Man make fire, man feel manly

silly_sad_machine — Wed, 24 Dec 2008 08:08:02 -0800

By silly_sad_machine

My father kept a fire burning in an old iron woodstove during the winter to heat our house. We lived in very, very rural Oklahoma, and while we had electricity and (eventually) satellite TV, central heat and air was a novelty to which we had never been introduced.

My father woke early - always. He was up long before we were, and when he finally woke us to get ready for school the fire was already burning hot. My sister and I would rush down from our bitterly cold second-floor rooms and scramble to be the first in front of the woodstove's single blower.

When I was old enough my father put me to building fires. He showed me exactly how to do it, as well. You laid out two sticks of wood about a foot apart, and you stacked about four more sticks of wood across the first two. The effect was to make a little cubby to shove in paper, cardboard and other household tinder.

I built a lot of fires in that woodstove during my teenage years, and I always used my father's method. As far as I knew, it was the only way to build fires. But it was amazingly difficult to do. Paper burns hot, but it also burns fast. You could cram that little cubby so full that paper wads were bursting back out onto the floor, and you'd still only get about 20 seconds of good, hot flame. With sticks of wood that were easily as big around as a softball, 20 seconds wasn't good enough.

My father never had a problem with it, though. His hands were like magic in the stove. He'd carry in a load of wood, toss in some paper and there was your roaring fire, no questions asked. But I can remember countless times when I admitted defeat, unable to get the fire to start after several tries. These were no "Leave it to Beaver" moments, though, and my father didn't toss an arm over my shoulder and give me a heart-to-heart. Not being able to start a fire was a black mark against my manhood, and he let me know it. Although he didn't put it so seriously (way too sarcastic to be serious), these were the things a man did, and by God I needed to learn how to do them.

Today I'm building fires in my own fireplace (our woodstove has a stone hearth built around it ... much better than my father's). It was built by my grandfather when he built the house, and its giant presence forms the base of the house's support structure.

The presence of an iron grate on the floor of the stove, however, prevents me from using my father's method of starting fires. It had been some years since I'd really built one, and I suddenly had to adjust and find my own method. In doing so, I learned something very interesting.

My father's method for building fires sucked.

How could the man honestly believe that he was teaching me to build fires if he never taught me anything about kindling? Watch any survival show and you'll learn there are three keys to building a fire: tinder, kindling and fuel. The tinder catches the flame, the kindling stokes the flame and the fuel burns and puts out heat. My father's method involved wads of newspaper (tinder, I guess?) and gigantic sticks of just-seasoned wood. That's it. And yet, somehow, he pulled it off.

As it turns out I can build a pretty good fire too, and it doesn't take me 10 tries, either. Although my father didn't teach me a good method for actually stoking a fire, I think now that maybe that's not what he was trying to do. Maybe he wasn't really trying to do anything, but what he did do was give me a deep and abiding fondness for a roaring fire in a black iron fireplace. It makes me feel like a real father and a real man like nothing else I've done in my life, and burning a fire in our home is like rekindling the heart of our family's legacy.

No, there was no way he was aiming for that. I think he just wanted an excuse to call me a puss.

Take your advice and …

Philmundo — Fri, 19 Dec 2008 22:39:01 -0800

By Phil Stott

My wife took my daughter to the grocery store, and got reprimanded for her parenting by a complete stranger, which infuriated me, and led me to consider: what's the best way to deal with an interfering busybody (however well-meaning)? And just where the hell do they get off anyway?

Thus far in our parenting careers, my wife and I have received exactly four pieces of unwanted information from random strangers, and every single time it's been in the supermarket. That's once every three months on average, provided no one else assails us between now and Maeve's birthday at the end of the month. What it is about our parenting skills that compel someone to interrupt their shopping to pronounce judgment on us is beyond me - our "offences" to date have included:

- Not having her in a sweater (granted, the store was over-air-conditioned, but it was 95 outside, not an unreasonable temperature for not having a sweater in the diaper bag).

- Having her sockless (again in summer). Because having an infant in socks for more than 45 seconds is completely do-able.

- Giving her our keys to play with to stop her from screaming the store down - not something we do on a regular basis (there's a lot of monitoring to make sure she doesn't try to eat them), but sometimes it's the only thing that works.

Looking at the list of offences, there's one common thread - not having enough junk in the diaper bag - that probably could have prevented all three instances. Having said that, the reality of parenting, at least for me, is that we spend our lives running around doing all the things we forgot to do yesterday while forgetting what we were supposed to do today. Assuming that anyone with the gall to offer unsolicited advice on a subject is presumably an expert (i.e. a parent or childcare specialist), wouldn't you think they'd recognize that and just cut you some slack?

Anyway, it seems like the person sticking their nose in where it isn't even remotely wanted is likely to be more or less a constant for the foreseeable future, so the question then becomes: how do we deal with it?

It seems to me that there's a sliding scale of appropriateness in terms of reaction, with my initial instinct tending towards the less polite end of it. Thankfully, I haven't been in the immediate vicinity on most of the occasions, so my two favorite words haven't been aired in public quite yet - and for the sake of an easy life, I have no desire for that ever to happen. With that in mind, I had a long think (and canvassed some friends) regarding what might be termed "more appropriate verbiage" in business-speak. Here are some of the best suggestions I garnered:

1) It occurs to me that just accepting the advice (or pretending to) might be a viable option, ruling out any potential conflict. Saying something like "You're absolutely right. Normally we'd have a sweater handy, but we only popped in for milk." Not my favorite suggestion, as I'm not in the habit of justifying my actions to a complete stranger, but definitely likely to diffuse an awkward situation.
2) A friend, meanwhile, agrees with me on the psychological satisfaction that comes with a decent brush-off, but has developed a more appropriate manner of delivering it. Basically, she pays the person scant attention and says something like "Thank you. She's fine." Short, to the point, and with the added benefit of pointing out that, yes, you do know what your kid's up to, and are aware of how to take care of them.
3) Further along the scale, another friend admitted that he once opted for the slightly more aggressive "If I'd wanted your advice, I'd have asked for it." The result? Stunned silence, and fleeting satisfaction, but a guilt trip at a later date. Probably best to reserve this one for the dealing with the rudest of the rude.
4) At the very end of the scale, the best lines are the ones you know you'll never use. In my head, I have a retort that goes something like "Thanks for your concern, I guess we just got so caught up in teaching her how rude it is to offer advice to complete strangers that we totally forgot to put her hat on."

Still, I'm pretty sure that there are some other ideas out there about how best to deal with the busybody (both tried and tested, and lurking in the recesses of the imagination). Feel free to share your best suggestions and war stories below.

Potty Training Adventures

tony — Wed, 19 Nov 2008 13:31:07 -0800

by Tony Chen

I was getting ready to leave work this past Monday when I got a 5-word text message from my wife:

"poo poo in the potty"

After months of trying, then dropping it (no pun intended), and then bringing it up again with our little one, little Meme finally poo poo-ed in the potty this week at day care! I can't tell you how much my heart was filled with pride. It almost rivaled the day he started walking. My co-workers must of thought I had lost it (again) as I just had to run out of my office and tell someone. "POO POO IN THE POTTY!"

The logical next thought, obviously: did the day care teacher take a picture of it?

It's been an interesting journey to get to this point. Potty training seems to be the topic that keeps going and going and going. On our facebook page, folks talk about it incessantly. Some Children's hospitals now offer "potty training school" for parents at their wits end. Guess how many times "potty training" was googled last month? 368,000. 368,000! I mean, that's almost as many searches that Brooke Burke gets.

My wife and I read all the tips - getting the right equipment, using rewards, scheduling potty breaks, etc. My parents told me stories about how I was potty-trained in one day by my grandmother -- she was floored to see your truly at 18 months, still in diapers. Come on, the kids in China are trained by 6-12 months of age, right? Apparently, all she did was strip my diaper off all day and lay some newspaper on the ground. I went. I saw it. And I was potty trained.

When all is said and done, potty training is basically this: when they're ready, they're ready. Yes, we could have done a lot of things (maybe even earlier than we thought) to get them ready. And yes, it's hard to maintain consistency in our 2-days-per-week-in-day-care, 2-days-per-week-with-grandparents life, but potty training is not something to force, either. We had seen more and more interest from him especially these last few weeks. He'd pretend to go. He'd look forward to the scheduled potty time. He really wanted that reward lollipop. The last straw was probably him seeing the kids at day care do it.

Anyway, what a relief. Now, let's see if we can get him to do it 2 days in a row. Then 3. Then a whole hectic week. Then, it's onto bedwetting.

Literary tykes

Philmundo — Mon, 27 Oct 2008 18:36:22 -0700

By Phil Stott

At a little under a year old, it would appear that reading is already one of my daughter's favorite things to do. Well, not reading exactly, but she loves to turn the pages of her board books, and I'm finding that there's no surer way to settle her down after a crying jag, or for bedtime, than sitting down with her and paging through something like Goodnight Moon or The Very Hungry Caterpillar.

As a literature and history major in college, seeing her enthusiasm for flipping pages - and the attention she gives her favorite ones - is something that's deeply satisfying for me. I'm under no illusions: I know she's not comprehending much of what's in the books beyond learning some vocabulary to store up for when she starts talking, but it does make me wonder if there's any link between exposure to "reading" material at a young age and a love of books as an adult.

The difference between a journalist and someone who writes blogs is that that question would be a jumping-off point for a journalist - they'd be on the phone finding sources and investigating it for an answer to be published in an article with a headline like "10 things you MUST do to make your child a success". For this blogger, though, it's enough to wonder about a link and then to say, well, it doesn't matter - she enjoys "reading," I enjoy it, and we're going to continue to do it, regardless of whether it may be good for her at some unspecified point in the future or not. (That by the way, kind of sums up my approach to parenting - being informed enough to know what's harmful, feeding a balanced diet, and refusing to sweat the rest.)

To that end, then, I'd like to offer a handful of tips to bear in mind when reading with your child.

1) Any time's a good time for a book. They don't have to be stored up for bedtime, story time, or any other time. Having an appointed time or ritual for reading can make it seem like a special occasion (or a valued part of routine), but quite often putting a book in front of a child's face can be the something that works to please them when nothing else will.

2) Use your voice. Bedtime story? Try making your voice lower and softer as you near the end of it. Lots of characters? Don't be afraid to use different accents, pitches etc. to make them stand out. Kids get a big kick out of anything that helps a story come alive.

3) Improvise. Legend has it in my family that my dad's versions of certain stories were so good that my brother and I wouldn't go to bed as kids if anyone else tried reading them. The karate-chopping pigs that beat up on a suspiciously German-sounding wolf before he could blow their houses down sticks in my mind even to this day. And it keeps the books from boring both the parent and the child.

4) Don't just read the story. In fact, sometimes, don't read it at all. In books for younger kids, the written words are only half the point. Use the pictures as learning aids. Repeat vocabulary to your child, and ask them to point to things as well. It won't work every time, but the first time they put their finger on the sun, a flower, or a ba-ba (as Maeve likes to say) is an incredibly rewarding feeling.

5) Don't do everything for them. Even in my lap, Maeve likes to turn the pages. Sometimes she just likes to flip through a book really fast without stopping to look at anything. That's fine by me, too: while books may be about learning, learning should be about having fun wherever possible. And if she's having fun, I usually am too, which is kind of the point of the whole thing.

A Daily Dose from a Working Mother

tkempster — Sun, 05 Oct 2008 18:33:01 -0700

Guest post by Ted Kempster

I'm not your typical, divorced, working mother.

My day starts at 5:30 a.m., when I get up and go online to tackle my overnight email and follow-up phone calls. My customers and field teams are global, so there's always something going on at that hour. On the 3.5 days a week that my children are in my care, at 6:00 a.m. I make sure my 14-year-old son is getting up. He needs to be out the door and headed to the bus-stop by 6:50 a.m. He has the typical "distractibility" of a teenager. Sometimes I realize around 6:30 that he's still in the shower and have to pound on the door to "encourage" him to hurry it up. At 6:30 a.m. I wake up my 9-year-old daughter and 12-year-old son. They need to be out the door by 7:30 (if the weather's fine) or I have to drop them off at school by 7:50.

At this point I'm in full "mother" mode ... reminding them about washing, brushing, deodorizing, combing and homework. I make lunches (cheaper than buying), organize snacks for the day (no nuts allowed for my 9-year-old, her classmate is allergic!), make breakfast (okay, usually cereal and juice, but sometimes eggs and biscuits, too) and make sure they're dressed appropriately, both for the weather and for school. It takes teamwork to make this happen successfully, and often I'm more the ringmaster while the children are doing the work.

After getting them on their bicycles or dropping them off, I'm racing to work for a full day of customer service account management. I listen to, empathize with, coordinate for, and advocate for my customers, acting as their liaison with corporate support and management. At 3 p.m. I'm out the door (thanks to flexible scheduling by my management) and on my way home to take care of my children after school. There are activities--scouts, sports, friends and homework. Sometimes these are interrupted for conference-calls. The children have been well-trained to know when I need silence, and to ask whether or not the phone is muted before they speak.

In the evenings I listen to, empathize with, coordinate for, and advocate for my children. One major difference between how I handle my customers and how I handle my children is that I also love them very, very much. I hold them, I read to them, I make sure they are clean and educated and sung-to and played with and tucked into bed ... and most of all, loved.

Bedtime is 8:30 p.m., okay, maybe 9:00 ... alright, sometimes 9:30. Then I'm back online and catching up with email from the afternoon (west coast, Asia-Pac) until 11 p.m. or midnight, sometimes later. At 5:30 a.m., it all starts again.

Thinking of this in terms of my company's Ten Core Values, the transferable lessons of parenting and work are self-evident:

Focus on their needs, deliver on promises.
Seize opportunities quickly; get it done now.
Complete what you say you are going to do; no excuses.
Treat each other with respect and do the right thing always.
Think creatively to provide the solution.
Develop best-of-breed products and services.
Know how we provide real value to our customers.
Collaborate smoothly with others, leveraging our diversity.
Maintain open, honest interaction, build relationships on trust.
Stay flexible, adapt as circumstances change

The above reads like a summary of any good parenting guide. They are goals and values I try to model for and teach to my children, and they see this in my approach to work as well.

Do I sound like a typical, divorced, working mother? Pretty much so, except that I'm their dad.

Working mothers and working, single, fathers are each presented with their own unique set of challenges and opportunities, but more and more I recognize our common experiences and see that we have a lot to learn from each other.

The Coolness of Dads

wonkitime — Tue, 16 Sep 2008 19:03:38 -0700

By Won Kim

Back in high school when popularity was at the top of my list of things to achieve (right next to varsity letter and a date to the prom), I was given an automatic ticket to coolness by my parents of all people. For some reason, they thought I was responsible and deserving enough to receive a Jeep Wrangler for my senior year. Granted, it was a hand-me-down, but still, anything that had a grill in the front and large wheels meant that I was rolling into school with cool written all over me.

I'm going to skip the details when my parents took away the Jeep a few months later, but let's just say, from September to December, I felt like the pubescent version of George Clooney, only if he happened to live in Missouri and had a face full of pimples.

Here's the funniest thing about driving a Jeep. There is a natural bond and recognition that takes place with others who drove similar four-wheel, gas-guzzling monsters. If stuck at a red light, I would nod at other Jeep drivers. On rare occasions, I would lower the music to yell out "nice rims" or something to that effect. These kinds of episodes continue to be reiterated throughout my life outside of the Jeep context.

Whether it was sharing nods with someone donning St. Louis paraphernalia or having small talk with someone in the media industry, the connectivity aspect still lives on. Lately, I've noticed my inclination to observe fathers, like, everywhere-in the mall, on the subway, walking in the park, at coffee shops, in my neighborhood, etc. On rare occasions, I will even take my iPod earphones off to say, "cute kid" or something to that effect.

Here's a little fact that I hope I'm not alone in sharing: fatherhood isn't that easy. Between working to feed the family, balancing the checkbook, changing diapers or potty training or shooing monsters away from the closet, there isn't much time to reflect on how the heck you're actually doing. I find myself relieved if my boy falls asleep without an episode at the dinner table.

That's where other dads come in. Who else outside of our spouses and close friends actually notices our journey into fatherhood? As you know, there's a journey "into" fatherhood, but never a journey out. Like a secret society, once in, there's no going back. So, next time you see a dad strolling their baby at the mall or sharing a pancake with their daughter at a local diner or walking hand-in-hand with their son in a park, why not show some recognition or better yet, ask them how it's going.

Trust me, there's nothing cooler than being a dad.

Kids on a Plane

wonkitime — Mon, 30 Jun 2008 14:07:36 -0700

by Won Kim

Nothing strikes greater fear to a parent than traveling cross-country on a plane with a small child. No matter how much you prepare for the voyage, there's no way to predict delays, turbulent patterns, passenger temperaments, and the most volatile of all subject matter-your own kid.

I've only traveled a few times on a plane with my son, but each time has brought its own story. Our very first flight took place when my son was still a young baby. He slept throughout the flight, and when it did appear as if he was stirring from his sleep, we would quickly place a bottle in his mouth to soothe him back to slumbering bliss. We went on another flight when he was around six months old, and once again, my son came through with flying colors (pun intended). In fact, our neighboring passengers and the flight attendants commented on how well-behaved our baby was.

Somehow, my son tricked me into believing that he was the perfect in-flight baby. Then Thanksgiving rolled around. By this time he was nearing 12 months in age, which meant the practice of placing a pacifier or bottle in his mouth would only have a lasting effect of 15 minutes, tops. This meant we would have to bring a bag-full of weapons to distract him from becoming "that" inconsolable baby on a plane. Our arriving flight to St. Louis went without any hiccups. During the takeoff time (when all electronic devices are rendered useless), we kept our son's attention fully occupied with various baby books, toys and Cheerios. Soon enough, the pilot announced the wonderful words of, "Now feel free to turn on any electrical devices and to move around the cabin." With a trigger hand that would make Wyatt Earp jealous, I cranked on our portable DVD player and voila, there were those lovable Baby Einstein puppets. Not only was my son completely engaged for the rest of the flight, but according to experts of the Baby Einstein products, my son just got a boost in his cognitive development.

I was so proud of my little guy. I felt like my son could travel to the moon and back without a glitch. Those sentiments would quickly change on our flight leaving St. Louis, or as NASA would say, "... we've got a problem."

The flight hit a rough patch early, with our plane sitting still on the takeoff lane for nearly 45 minutes. Because the pilot didn't know if we would be the next plane taxied to the front of the line, all passengers had to comply by the "sit back in your seats with all electrical devices turned off." Fortunately, between my wife and I, we were able to entertain our little guy for the full 45 minutes. However, by then, we had completely exhausted our resources of baby books, toys, in-flight magazines and impromptu battle of the Animal Crackers.

Once in the air, we loaded up the DVD player, which thankfully employed the attention of our kid. A couple hours later, I checked my watch and calculated that about 30 minutes remained in our flight. Already our flight had taxed us for 45 extra minutes, but I was grateful to be landing soon. Little did I know, Newark airport had plans to give us 80 minutes of bonus time.

Almost as quickly as our pilot told us to "turn off all electrical devices and put your seats in the upright position," he came back on the plane's PSA system to quickly state, "Newark airport has told me there is some airplane congestion, so we're going to circle around once and see if we don't get a more favorable report."

What we all hoped would be one circle became two, then three, then four, and then I lost count. Soon, my wife and I were entrenched in an all out battle to keep our hungry, uncomfortable baby from completely losing it. Electrical devices could not be used, so we started recycling our baby books, toys, in-flight magazines and miscellaneous items from my wife's tote bag

Then I smelled it. My son had just laid a bomb on the plane. Okay, I know it's not politically correct to use the b-word in conjunction with an airplane, but there's no other way to describe what my son did in his diaper. I'm almost positive that his diaper would have been considered some type of chemical weapon. As soon as I stood up to take him to the bathroom, the flight attendant signaled for me to sit down as the seatbelt sign was still illuminated. However, when she saw the look on the faces of the passengers seated near us, she quickly signaled my release to the bathroom.

You know the saying, "When it rains it pours," well, it started to pour. See, my wife had packed three diapers in our tote bag, and unfortunately our son was wearing the third diaper. Once in the small lavatory, I quickly transformed into the dad-version of MacGyver. I took off the diaper and proceeded to wipe all of the "stuff" off into the toilet. I did the best I could to rebuild a dirty diaper into something that could be used again with some level of effectiveness. I used toilet paper as extra lining for the diaper, and placed some additional toilet paper in the most-likely-to-be-hit-again areas. It had to be the worst makeshift diaper known to man, but with a squirmy-on-the-verge-of screaming-his-head-off baby balanced atop a tiny diaper station, I think I did well.

I exited the restroom with a baby wearing a partly-soiled diaper in my arms. My wife took one look at my face and realized that I had just journeyed into the land of Mordor and survived. Sitting with the little guy on my lap, I prayed under my breath for a quick end to this flight. Almost as soon as I prayed that, I heard the pilot over the PSA say, "Good news, we've been given the green light. We should be landing in 20-25 minutes." Ah yes, we would come out of this flight unscathed.

But as quickly as my mood turned into joy, my little guy completely lost it. I try not to think too much about those last 25 minutes, but it was one of the most uncomfortable episodes in my life. My son screamed bloody murder for the full 25 minutes as my wife and I played hot potato with his flailing body. Some passengers looked away as if embarrassed for our predicament, and some stared directly at us with a look of utter aggravation. Even a couple flight attendants swung by our seats to see if there was anything they could do to help. I reminded them that I never pressed the flight attendant button, and unless by help they meant they could land this plane right now, none of their niceties were of assistance.

Obviously we survived the flight, but without some level of scarring. For the next year following that episode, we completely stayed away from flying. It wasn't until our son turned two and a half did we venture on another plane. In case you were wondering, he seems to enjoy riding on a plane.

My theory about that terrible flight is simple: the actual trip of the flight was two hours longer than planned, we were one diaper short and we didn't have him sucking on a pacifier which would have eased the air pressure in his ears. I think if we had another attempt at it, our memory of that day might be easier to swallow.

Still, there was an important lesson from that flight: what goes up must eventually come down. In other words, no matter how horrible your in-flight experience may be with your kid, try to focus (while it is happening) on the fact that you will eventually get off the plane and reach your destination. Unless of course, it's a connecting flight.

Baby Rocky: Rounds One and Two

anthonyromanelli — Thu, 26 Jun 2008 20:03:35 -0700

by Anthony Romanelli

Within the last two weeks, our daughter, 8 months old, has decided to double as a boxer who enjoys the idea of beating herself up. Not exactly, but it is sure seeming that way...

Our crib has three settings. The first setting is for the newborn-the mattress is closest to the top of the crib...this way, we old fogies don't have to bend all the way down to pick up baby precious. The second setting is for when baby precious turns a bit older, but not old enough to pull herself up, but she can if she wanted to. The final setting is all the way at the bottom of the crib, this way, baby precious can't pull herself out of the crib...her arms may barely be above the top of the crib.

Well, this past weekend we have learned that Baby J is stronger and more willing than we give her credit for...On FRIDAY (Round One): Baby J is taking her nap with the crib on the middle setting, and while both my wife and I are in separate parts of the upstairs where the bedrooms are, we both separately hear a "THUD." We both shot up and ended up meeting in the middle of the hallway, curious and worried at the same time. We open the door and Baby J is OUTSIDE the crib, howling on the floor. "Oh, my God," we both spout off in amazement. I pick her up and just hold her while she wails. Moments later Baby J reaches out toward mommy, who also helps calm her down. We immediately move the mattress down to the lower level.

Score: Floor: 1
Baby J: 0

On SATURDAY (Round Two): Baby J is taking her afternoon nap with the mattress in the absolute lowest point in the crib...no way she can beat herself up, right? Um, there IS a reason I'm writing this, right? Well, she eventually wakes up because I hear her chatting herself up. (At some point, just sit outside your child's room and just listen to them babble, it's ridiculously adorable. Anyway, I continue to let her babble away and I leave with a tiny "My kids are so cute," kind of grin.

Five minutes later, my wife goes in and gets Baby J from her nap and yells to me, "Honey, come here." I walk in and see blood on her mattress and blood all over my little girl's face.

"What the hell?" I say. I look closer and with a pretty good guess I gather that Baby J IS strong enough to pull herself up, but NOT strong enough to KEEP herself up for any period of time-she probably pulled herself up and fell face first into the corner of the crib-which is solid oak, by the way. The cool part of this, if there is one...Baby J NEVER CRIED...she just took a beating from a crib and completely sloughed it off as if it was nothing.

Score: Crib: 0

Baby J: 1

Just give Baby J a pair of boxing gloves and a mouthpiece...for the briefest of moments she made me think, "My kid is tougher than your kid."

Help! I think my kid needs yoga!?

anthonyromanelli — Fri, 13 Jun 2008 18:54:00 -0700

by Anthony Romanelli

B-R-E-A-T-H-E and S-T-R-E-T-C-H...

In the American Heritage College Dictionary Yoga is defined as: "1. a Hindu discipline aimed at training consciousness for a state of perfect spiritual insight and tranquility. 2. A system of exercises practiced as part of this discipline to promote control of the body and mind. Yoga- Union, joining."

While I'm well aware of the definition of yoga, I think we are about to put it into practice. Not for me, I'm plenty "yoga-fied," but for our daughter, 31 months and as hyper as the day is long. Don't believe me? Come follow me on one daily dose of toddler insanity...

Our daughter seems to have SERIOUS issues when Daddy comes into the room as she wakes from her nap. When my wife walks in, there's the occasional whimper and bed-head, as she is just coming to...however, when I walk in, she SCREAMS, "NO, DADDY!" It has happened twice in the last week and has been happening for quite some time. To prove to my wife I do nothing differently, I made her stand outside our daughter's door as I walked into her room.

It begins like this: "MOMMY," she calls from the door. The issue arises upon the opening of the door, by....me. "NO, DADDY, I WANT MOMMY."

As calm as the seas, I state, "I'm sorry, sweetheart, Mommy is busy right now."

"NOOOO," she screams.

This continues, "NO, NO, NO,"

I wait in the room. I walk to the corner of the room and sit in the chair while I listen to ‘daddy's little girl,' blubber like ‘daddy's-never-ending-crier." I wait longer. I am upwards of 7 - 8 minutes while she just cries and cries.

"Honey, once you calm down, then we can leave the room. Mommy is busy, and your sister is still sleeping," I say.

Rocking with stuffed kitty and blanket in hand, the bellowing mellows itself for the briefest of moments. I naively believe we're in the clear and we can proceed downstairs. I actually have the nerve to GET UP from the chair, really believing we can go.

"NO, NO NO," flails the little one. We are now at about 11 minutes post wake up, still trying desperately to leave the sob filled carpet. She begins to anxiously pick at her toenails, wanting to fight me every step of the way.

"It looks as if your toenail is half-off, would you like Daddy to help get it off?"

"Mm-hmm. Yes."

"EUREKA," I say to myself.

I lean in and tug at her toenail, realizing it's not going anywhere without a legitimate clipping. The last thing I need is to erupt ‘Mount Saint Maggie' again. "Let's go downstairs and get that clipped."

"NOOOOOO!" And erupt, she does.

"Damnit," I think to myself. "I thought I was there with her, in the clear, ready to go. Damnit, damnit, damnit."

At that very moment, I realize that my daughter may truly be lacking the coping skills needed when things are not going her way. We are 14 minutes post nap and still nowhere closer to getting downstairs and beginning our afternoon.

Yoga. That's what she needs. She needs to be taught how to breathe. Though we have showed her how to breathe when she gets angry, she does not use the technique. I exit the room and say one simple word to my wife, "See?

She does see. She has always known that our daughter wakes easier with her for some reason. We have tried everything we can think of and now wonder if finding ways to calm her inner seas through yoga is the answer. A tiny yoga mat for tiny feet and a monster temper? Not sure the mat is big enough for the two of them...Is it?

Is it? Any advice? I am 100% willing to listen.

As an additional FYI, we have tried AT LEAST the following:

Shown her how to breathe
Look us in eye when doing so
Made her count to calm herself down (big fans of that 1-2-3) book
Make her call for Daddy and not Mommy, that way she's expecting me
Left the room, waited for her to calm down, then I still open the door (if we give in to allowing my wife to open the door, there's no consistency there)
I have told her, and not my wife, "Ok, you may come out now."

It seems as if this is a ‘Daddy Only' issue...AND, this is the only time she explodes like this WITH me....she only explodes when I walk into the room upon her waking herself up from nap...

Need advice.

I could go on, but I actually applaud you for getting this far...

A~