Even Mom's Need to Go Poo!

Now that I’ve mothered a 3.5 boy for a week, I feel I am capable of giving advice.  As you know, parenting is not as easy as one might think.  However, you can work with what you’ve got.

1.       Kids are afraid of the dark: Use this to your advantage.  For example, when I need some alone time (like to go number 2) I go into the basement and don’t turn on any lights.  A 3.5 year old won’t venture down stairs and into a dark hallway if they are afraid of the dark.  Instead, they’ll stand at the top of the stairs and yell “Mom? Mom, what are you doing?”  Adding some heavy breathing to the darkness can scare them away from the top of the stairs and back into their room.

2.       Kids get a lot of colds and that’s not necessarily a bad thing:  Sure, your kid might be cranky during the day and almost always covered with snot, but there’s also Children’s Night-time Cough Syrup.  I recommend the grape flavor, it goes down smooth.  And 30 to 60 minutes later you have a snoring child who won’t wake up for at least 10 hours.  Now’s the time to turn on Hulu and catch-up on all of your shows.

3.       Things we said we’d NEVER do, DO them, even if just for the laughs: Remember when we said we’d never make our kids eat foods they don’t want to? Yeah, we’re doing that now.  Someone didn’t want to eat his celery today.  He was given a choice; he could eat the two pieces of celery or take a five minute timeout and forgo television for the rest of the day.  Three hours later he chose to take the timeout.  There were a lot of laughs for us parents during the three hours – and even more after he finished his timeout and asked “can I watch TV now?”

4.       Don’t read movie related books at bedtime, read Dr. Seuss instead: When a child LOVES a certain movie, like Cars, they know the story by heart and get excited at all the right parts.  When you’re trying to calm them down for the night, reading them a Cars themed book is NOT a good idea.  It’s better to read a book that has a consistent cadence (like a rhyme) and makes no sense. I mean, How Many Thinks Can You Think?