In the past four years, I’ve made a lot of poor parenting decisions. I admit it. In fact, my motto for the first couple of years was, “Gimme a break! I’m just wingin’ here, kid.” I don’t always know what I’m doing, and I’ll be the first to confess that sometimes there is absolutely no logic behind some of my decisions. However, every once in a while, I get something right, and sometimes it’s when I’m not even trying. Take Tivo, for example. One of the best parenting decisions Ken and I ever made, and we weren’t even doing it for the kids. In fact, it was a birthday present to me from Ken before we even had kids, but man, has it paid for itself several times over.
To begin with, we don’t have to own a lot of kid movies. I just record them off the TV and bring then up with the touch of button. Awesome. Plus, if Edie’s really in a Charlie and Lola phase, then I can record that as well to have on hand in a pinch. But my favorite thing about Tivo (in relation to the children, that is) is that Edie doesn’t watch commercials. In fact, I think she has seen about two in her whole life. Ok, maybe that’s a bit stretching it, maybe three. If her show even begins to start to break to commercial, you can bet in the next second she is going to yell out, “Can someone turn my show back on?!” Which on a side note, completely baffles me because she will say this while I am sitting on the couch RIGHT NEXT to her and she’ll be looking directly at me.
“Yea, sure, someone can,” I’ll say real sarcastic back to her because, you know, four-year-olds totally get sarcasm.
Anyway, back to my main point, the kid never watches commercials. She has no idea of the toys that she’s been missing out on because she’s so impatient during commercial breaks. There is a whole world out there just waiting to advertise to her if she will just give them the chance.
There have been a couple of times I was slow on the draw and didn’t get to the fast forward button in time. It seems like every commercial she sees, she then declares afterward that she MUST have what they are selling. Again, just another way that Tivo has paid for itself.
Well, the other week, we were in a similar scenario, and either I didn’t hear the request for “someone” to fast forward or I was messing around on the computer and tuning it out. (Don’t act like you don’t do the same thing with your kids!) Either way, Edie saw a commercial, and within seconds, she was running in asking if I would buy her a Butterfly Garden. Seeing a chance to teach her a life lesson, I said, “No. I’m not going to buy you a Butterfly Garden, but if you earn the first $15 dollars of it, I will pay the rest.” Let’s face it, that’s more money than she has ever seen in her whole life, and I really thought she might get that Butterfly Garden sometime around her eighth birthday. But I momentarily forgot that she is a product of Ken McKibben.
She washed every dish she could get her hands on, and she hosted another lemonade stand. She picked up leaves in the front yard after her father trimmed the shrubs, and she even straightened her brother’s room for a quarter (which took a lot of pride swallowing since she didn’t make the mess). She was not above asking family members to donate to her cause, but don’t worry, I always followed up that she needed a chore to perform before she could take their money. And she scrubbed the bathroom mirrors at the first sight of smudges.
It only took her two weeks before she had saved enough to meet her end of the bargain, and so, I made good on my promise.
Edie is now the mother of four hungry caterpillars. She spends a large part of her day watching over them and giving us minute by minute updates on their shenanigans.
Running into the kitchen from her bedroom, “Look Mommy! Arthur is upside down!” or “Shhh! The caterpillars are all sleeping.”
I wish I could remember all their names, but Edie is asleep right now, so I will have to introduce them all to you later. But for now, here are the four newest members of our family in all their caterpillar glory:
DAY TWO
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