Friday, July 17, 2009

Joey and Grace, aka "Ding and Dong"

I can't figure this kid out. He's four years old, and I still have no idea what's going to come out of that kid's mouth. The other day, he tried to get my mom to give him some crackers. She said he could take some in the car with him because he was just about to leave. He said, "How about if I snap my fingers like this (snap), and then you get me some crackers?" Sheesh!

Then last night, I bought the dog some new balls. She hid her other ones and we can't find them. Joey decided to throw one over to the neighbor's yard. The neighbor was outside, so Joey climbs onto the deck and yells,
"Hey, Mr. Cory! You throw that ball back over here!"
Mr. Cory: "Why don't you come over and get it yourself?" (Mr. Cory knows how to deal with Joey)
Joey: "Because your wife won't let me come into your house!" (totally not true, although I wouldn't blame her.)

Joey also is upset that he has to feed the dog. As soon as he does, she licks his hand. I told him that's how dogs say "thank you". He said, "That's terrible."

The neighbors on the other side let me know, while laughing hysterically, that they get "updates" from the window from little Gracie. I didn't know my darling little girl was publishing what goes on at our house from my bedroom window. They especially liked it when she told them Matt was eating out of the garbage, and they could hear me screeching in the background about how disgusting it was to eat out of the garbage. I think I'll keep the windows closed from now on.

Rant (Sorry)

I realized the other day that all of our kids can walk! Pretty soon all of them will be doing their business in the toilet, we'll have no more cribs (first time in 8 years!), we have no infant car seats, someday we'll have no diaper bag! Can you imagine? Boy, life will be easy then. Yeah right. That's about the time I become the full time chauffeur, right? I'm only a part time chauffeur now. Always dragging the little ones to the big one's stuff, or vise versa. But I did look at the little fingerprints on the window and the little tiny shoes scattered by the front door, and got a little sad because I know they won't be there soon. Boy, time is going fast....

And here begins the rant:
I don't know if I told you this, but I found a preschool for Joey! My friend from church, Kim, works there. I'm feeling pretty comfortable about sending him. She knows all about his allergies and their severity. We went to other schools, to take little tours, and I would always talk with the teachers about it. I was always met with this response, "Oh, it's no big deal. We've had other kids with allergies, and for snack time we just have them sit at their own table." Excuse me?! It's "no big deal"!? Are you insane? One molecule of nut in this boy's mouth, or on his hands, and he dies. It's no big deal? And you'll separate him from the other kids and make him sit in solitude for something that's not his fault? No thanks.

So I'm really excited about this preschool. I was sitting at a play area at the mall a few weeks ago and ran into another mother that took her twins there. We got to talking and discovered that our boys had the same allergies, and have had the same background with doctors not knowing what was wrong with our babies, and not believing us when we suggested what the problem was. And her kids went to the same school! I think it's meant to be. The school is proactive in keeping him safe, and ask all the parents to avoid bringing anything with nuts there. Ahh, finally, some common sense.

I've always been afraid of the way other parent's will react to not being able to bring nuts. But really, how big of a sacrifice is it -- to (heaven forbid) not have our kids eat something? Is it really that much of a sacrifice to have the peanut butter sandwich as an after-school snack instead of endangering a little boy's life? Should we not teach our children respect, restraint, and sympathy toward other people and their life's situations? Maybe we should get rid of all the handicapped parking spaces. After all, how dare they ask us to park 10 feet farther away from the front door? How dare someone ask us to refrain from eating whatever we darn well please! We are Americans! We should be able to eat anything, all day long!!!

Okay, I'm better now. Thanks for listening.