What You Say Vs What They Hear

I keep wondering what is it that makes my kid do the opposite of what I ask (read threaten/yell) him to do.

These are the very regular occurrences in our house:

• Stand still gets interpreted as be anything but still.
• Be quiet or HUSH= keep chattering incessantly.
• Just a minute/second= I want it NOW!
• Give me a minute to catch my breath= peppered by demands.
• No iPad/TV = GIVE iPad/TV NOW!
• Let's eat dinner= I want JAMP (jam).
• Let's each lunch= I want chips!
• Let's brush your teeth= eating the toothpaste.
• Rinse your mouth properly= water trickling out of the corners of the mouth with zero rinsing having taken place.
• Enough ketchup= squeezing out another massive glob of it.
• Eat properly with the spoon= eating with both hands in one go and looking absolutely simian in the process.
• DON'T=DO
• ENOUGH= NEVER ENOUGH
• I'M ANGRY WITH YOU= thousands of kisses rained on my face as a bribe.
• GO STAND IN THE CORNER= slowly inching away from the corner and smiling like an evil monkey.
• Let's not put the Play Doh on the sofa= rubbing it even more into the fabric.
• Don't write on the walls= put handprints with paint instead.
• GO TO SLEEP= STAY UP AN EXTRA HOUR JUST TO SPITE ME.

See what I mean!

Clearly I live in the Land of Opposite and MLM is King!

Letter To My Child

I plan to have MLM read this when he can link more than three words together and has attained the attention span of a human instead of a bee buzzing from flower to flower. So essentially I'll have to wait till he hits 30.

Dear Monkeyboy

1. When I sleep don't stick your fingers up my nose. I do that all by myself and in a far more efficient manner, thank you.
2. The moment I'm lying down don't assume I'm pretending to be a trampoline. The extra fat wasn't piled on keeping in mind your need to bounce.
3. If I bend down to retrieve my slippers or wipe the floor after you've trailed food on it; don't climb on my back thinking it's horsey time. It'll be time for a chiropractor if that continues my friend.
4. STAY ON YOUR SIDE OF THE BED or go in sleep your cot. This body was not meant to be squished into a tiny sliver of a space. If it was, my clothes would be marked XS instead of XL!
5. Don't beg and plead each time you want something. I grow immune. Learn to time your pleading...it's far more effective and you'll be surprised how far a sad face goes when it's used sporadically instead in a drop of a pin.
6. When I'm gesturing wildly on a phone call and don't sound all that perky, it is definitely not the best time to say, "Susu is coming." "Potty is coming is even worse". Use the loo by yourself as you are wont to do when you think am not watching.
7. When I ask you to go to the loo to do your business before we set out in the car, GO! Saying you need to go when am at a red light or in the midst of heavy traffic doesn't magically conjure up Port-a-potties all over the place.
8. Hugs and kisses are fine. In fact they are great! But when given after a calm and steady manner it's even better than attacking me like a herd of stampeding rhinos.
9. The powder either stays in the jar/bottle or goes on your body. Putting it all over the floor where I go careening all over the place is not what Johnson & Johnson made it for. If you really want me to go sliding off somewhere, ask your father to take us to Aspen.
10. You  biting me on the cheeks was fine when you were a drooly baby. Now with teeth like a barracuda, it hurts.
11. Don't chomp down on the toothbrush every time. I have to pry your teeth apart like I use the car's jack and while it gets the job done, I'm in danger of getting a tennis elbow without ever having lifted a racquet!
12. Your father and I like to watch the t.v every now and then you know. And that goes double for us using the iPad. Something about being able to enjoy the stuff we paid through our nose for.
13. My phone is mine. I give it to you when you're in the throes of a major meltdown but it's mine. You asserting ownership over it aint gonna help!
14. The sofas are for sitting on and their backs are not balancing bars. We'll put you in a gymnastics class once you're older. That goes for karate as well so stop chopping at me and swinging your toys like their nunchuks!
15. We have our taste in music when we drive. Dance Gymbo Dance looped for miles on end does nothing for us enjoying the long drive. 
16. The iPad charger, the laptop mouse are not pets. Stop dragging them around the house. We'll get you a pet once your allergies abate.
17. When I make the bed, for once forget the Parachute time from Gymboree. I can't fly the "parachute" for each bed I make.
18. What is this fascination for clothespins? I end up stepping on them or sitting on them at all odd places and can never find them when I'm hanging out the laundry. 
19. Watering the plants are fine. Drowning them is not. And no...they don't want to take a bath like you do for an extended time.
20. Don't take my gripes to heart. You're beautiful but try targeting more sleep time because when you sleep my world is a more serene place.

With Love Always,

Your Deranged Mother

Hold A Mirror Up to Me

Last night during dinner Red saw a side of MLM he hadn't seen before and till date has only heard me speak of. His adult side.

The offspring's speech isn't as clear as many of his peers and often in his hurry to say a lot of things he garbles sounds up and they sound funny.

On many occasions we ( he and I together) have a laugh about it but last night it turned out he was pretty darn serious about what he was trying to say and my laughing at that moment made him quite peeved.

He gave me the look that my mother, father and many a teacher have leveled at me over the years. It's a combination of when-will-you-grow-up-and-act-your-age+I-will-wait-till-you-stop-your-nonsense-and-then-continue-with-what-I-have-to-say-instead-of-lowering-myself-to-your-level.

He gazed at me in a manner so serious that I was actually taken aback and had a glimpse of him as an adult. If he had the vocabulary he'd have told me to stop acting juvenile!

Having the tables turned on me was not much fun. I realized I was being obnoxious- another word he'll eventually learn and that the balance of power had shifted from me to him in an instant.

Yikes!

Necessity, Thou ART the ancestor of creativity!

Parenting is about a lot of things- I will NOT touch upon patience (why break one's head about a quality that's been elusive and will continue to play hard to get for all eternity?) but that apart parenting has got LOADS to do with creativity.
Again, if you aren't totally off your rocker courtesy your kid's antics, you'll be able to harness it fairly well and when required.

MLM is at best a fussy eater. He isn't fussy about what he eats, he's just fussy about eating. Why bother to stop and eat when he could be playing, watching that cursed Chhota Bheem, smearing 'kalash' (colors) on everything from his hair to my nose?
So like it or not the telly becomes an accomplice during feeding time. He gets entranced by the yellow people aka The Simpsons or the goody-two-shoes Bheem and allows me to spoons what I think is an adequate amount of food in his mouth. Threats of turning the t.v. off work extremely well in getting him to open up. It's my personal 'Open Sesame' as it were.

Tonight was no different- he was refusing to eat and I was adamant about not mushing his food so I could almost funnel it down his gullet. And as ever, sighs, Bheem baba was displaying his valor for all the nincompoops like my kid. I made small balls of the rice and curry and kept feeding MLM each one saying they were Bheem's laddoos. He didn't notice each one got progressively larger and he ate till I could do the tummy metrics and deduce he'd eaten *enough*. Of course, in case I didn't get the message fast enough, MLM also told me by raising his palms- EMUFF!!

So a child fed, very little threats doled out and some imgaination was displayed. Plenty of pats on the back- all by myself but hey...you gotta take what's there. If I wait for a bravo I'll be waiting till the cow come home.

But the whackiest and most imaginative thing was done was Red a few minutes ago. We're supposed to get MLM to do inhalations with Vicks or Karvol and Red being all congested too it becomes a way to spend quality time as a family. But where do I come in? Ever watch those shows were those herpotologists try to track down and then measure those boas and anancondas? The snake writhes like nobody's business and the people have to fight to not get knotted up in its coils? Well, the steam inhalation process with MLM is quite like that. He pretzels himself and whoever else is holding him till he's as far away from the rising steam as possible!!
To hold him steady or to get the inhaler close to him while Red's got a grip on him is my main role.

Anyhow, this little squirmer has always had a thing for the red clothes hamper we have in the bathroom. His father had set him down in it once when he was younger and I think that had created a memorable memory in his freaky noggin. So while the fight between father and son ensued, the hamper was brought forth and aforementioned squirmer was released. He dumped all the clothes out of it and said PUT! We ain't stupid. Most of the times. We put him in the hamper and took care to place the lid on top. Now before anyone decides to call Child Care services let me interject that the hamper has holes all over it and allows for PLENTY of ventilation. So there he sat, crouched inside, thinking he'd outsmarted us and his father held the inhaler close to the walls of the hamper and let the smoke waft in.

And that's how you get a child to do inhalation. If you're (un)lucky. When I was his age I responded to the "or else" my mother used to dole out with unfailing regularity. No hamper-shamper for me.

I wonder what's next. I really, really do. And going by recent history I wonder if we have big enough containers for his Littleness when the next challenge comes along!