Smart is a start. I like smart. Smart aleck, just makes me giggle.
We have reached the stage with the oldest, where he has started to understand double-meanings or potential loopholes in instructions.
It can be infuriating when you are in the wrong mood.
Sometimes it is an innocent mistake where you realize it was just your fault for being clear. We told our oldest to clean the mirror in the bathroom for one of his commission earning chores today, and he promptly went and started cleaning a mirror in a bathroom. It was the wrong one, but he didn’t know that.
My wife and I got to laugh at our own mistake.
Sometimes it is down right naughty, like when he is given privileges to watch TV, but told he can’t watch YouTube. He will turn something on, usually something short, and proceed to open YouTube as if the other show was a chore earning him the privilege of not asking.
Still other times, it isn’t harmful or even our fault. It is when he legitimately sees something different and chooses to point it out.
The boys have a bunk bed and the bunk has a trundle underneath the bottom bed. We rarely use it, but it has come in handy several times. Most often, it gets used by the boys to roll off the bottom bed or to jump onto.
The other night, as I was trying to get them ready for bed, they had energy from somewhere I cannot fathom. At that time of night I have already been awake and working about 16 hours. They had rolled the trundle out from its neat hiding place and were jumping on it.
Without an ounce of anger, I said “stop jumping on the bed.”
The oldest responded, without a second’s thought, “we’re jumping OFF the bed.” He then proceeded to leap from the bed and turn to WALK back onto it in order to leap off again.
I laughed. He laughed. My wife laughed.
I’m not going to pretend I didn’t think it was funny. It was not only unexpected, but completely appropriate and pretty witty for a 6 year old. I appreciate good humor, even when I’m tired and grumpy.
The younger one is at the stage when he thinks he can effectively challenge me. I think there are a couple stages to that…the later one, in the teens, where they legitimately think they can. I don’t look forward to that one. This is the early one. The one where they just want to test some boundaries and enjoy getting chased around the house, but occasionally stick their chin out in a stubborn defiance.
This is the stage I don’t do very well with as a dad.
While the older one makes me laugh, the younger one is trying to defy every rule, boundary, or system that exists to keep a routine and some peace in the house. It isn’t literally every moment, but it certainly feels like it.
Every dinner is a chance for him to hate the meal he liked just the week before and refuse to eat it. He is learning through not eating that isn’t a choice he gets to make. He sticks his little bottom lip out and pouts and then says his tummy or his throat hurts. Anything to get out of a meal. If dessert is offered, he isn’t full anymore, though. His throat only hurts if it is salad or something salty or savory.
If medicine had uncovered the miracles of sweets, there would be no ill left for the industry to exist.
Every requirement or a chore is an opportunity for him to try and set his own boundaries on what we are allowed to tell him to do. Sometimes an overt “no” escapes his lips, but the drama in his eyes belies the fact he knows he has crossed a line. More often is the subtle resistance of pretending he didn’t hear you. He just continues what he is doing and awaits the second or the third iteration, usually with a threatening voice, before even acknowledging your presence.
I tell you, this stage is infuriating.
However, this is also the stage when he has started to figure out how to do things for himself. That is the fun part of the initial independence push. He is beginning to figure out that he can clean up without help and that he can brush his teeth without just chewing the brush.
I think the trick is what I sort of just stumbled onto, which is to put everything as a challenge. It isn’t enough to say he needs to brush his teeth, but that he probably can’t do it on his own because he isn’t big enough yet. I promise, he’s going to prove you wrong.
The little way his chest puffs out every time he proves me wrong by doing exactly what I wanted him to do, I well up with a little pride. The look of triumph on his face for accomplishing a basic task, like cleaning up his toys or putting his dirty laundry in the hamper, which he isn’t fast enough to do in time or tall enough to accomplish, is a victory I will gladly give him.
Then he is told to get dressed for the day, and looks at me deadpan in the face, with a stone cold serious look on his face and says, “no.” Well, that is a game we don’t play in this house.
Fortunately, his memory is still short. Usually a short nap or bedtime stories and he’s all giggles again, even if he has a terrible day in which he spends the majority of it in timeout.
Those two are a handful. To think they have a little sister on the way….what were we thinking!? Laughs aside, he’ll grow out of this stage and I can’t wait until my 3-year old daughter tries this stuff to see if I am any better at it.
“How To Raise A Superhero” is going on my reading list, not just because I think the title sounds cool, but I also need any guidance I can get.
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