Monkey in a Christmas Tree

The weather was beautiful today, so we decided to take Troy to the park. We picked a different playground, which has a lot of different things for kids to do; such as a boat, a zip line, a castle, and a little Old West ghost town.

Right in the center, there is a large green rope tree. It has a conical shape, so Troy said it looked like a Christmas tree. At first, he avoided it, choosing safer and less complicated things to try. But as he grew bolder, he became more and more curious about it. Finally, he saw another young boy climbing all over the ropes, and he felt like he could do it too. So, up Troy went.

He was a little unsteady at first, having to learn how to balance his shoes on the thin ropes. But he picked it up quickly, and soon he was scrambling quickly all over the big green tree. At one point, he said, “Check me out, dada. I’m a monkey in a Christmas tree.”

Indeed he was. Complete with monkey sound effects.

You're done, dada!

Apparently, if you don’t play a game the way that Troy wants to play, then he now tells you that you’re no longer allowed to play with him. I know this, because I “broke the rules” twice this morning, and I was told, “You’re done, dada. You’re done.”

The first time I got in trouble was when he asked for help putting his dinosaur puzzle together. He couldn’t find the piece he needed, but when I pointed it out to him, he pushed it away and told me he didn’t want to do that piece yet. I kept insisting that it was the correct piece, but he more frantically pushed it away. Finally, I threw it on the floor, and that’s when I got in trouble. I was banned from working on the puzzle and asked to physically leave the little table until I had thought about what I did wrong. I know this because I tried to come back early and was told that I was stilled banned from the table. “No, you’re done, dada. You’re done.”

The second time was when he was playing with his music puzzle, where it plays a song when you put the piece on the puzzle. He was lifting them off and then putting them right back down again one-by-one. I unceremoniously dumped the puzzle over, sending all of the pieces off at once. I was once again told that I was done and that I had to leave the table. I’m not sure how long my banishment will last this time, or how many more strikes I’ll get before I’m not allowed to play altogether.

UPDATE: We went to the house of some friends of ours tonight for Friendsgiving, and at one point, Troy mysteriously disappeared. I went looking for him and found him in the room of our friends' little boy. He was sitting quietly playing with some cars of various sizes. I decided to sit down and keep him company. He welcomed my presence and immediately started showing me the cars and explaining some of their finer points...color, whether the doors open or not, and their supposed function.

He held up one gray car and said, "It's a Jaguar." Not recognizing the car from its sporty body style, I took it from him and examined it. I concluded that it was actually a Porsche, and I proceeded to tell him this. I was met with, "No dada, it's a Jaguar." I told him it wasn't a Jaguar, and he exclaimed, "It is!" Fearing that I was already on thin ice and not wanting to risk an additional demerit, I kept quiet and let him have his erroneous beliefs.

It is!

I was sitting doing puzzle with Troy tonight, and he picked up a piece, pointed at a vacant spot in the puzzle, and asked me if it went there. I shook my head no, and he replied, “It is!” And then, he proceeded to try to force it into the spot he’d indicated. When it didn’t fit, he looked at me again. I again shook my head no. He exclaimed, “It is!” And kept pushing it into the spot.

In this case, he actually meant “It does.” But I’ve also heard him use this phrase correctly. For example, when he stole my wife’s pillow. I told him that it wasn’t his, and he needed to give it back to her. He replied, “It is!” This, of course, went round and round with me giving logical arguments to disprove his claim on the pillow, only to be met with the same two-word exclamation. In the end, I gave up and let my wife dispute it with him.

It’s so cute the way he says it, though. I love hearing it, even if he is being cheeky or defiant when he says it.  I love his little boy voice.

Wrestle Mania

I absolutely love wrestling with Troy. There’s something so manly about pitting your strength against another man to see if you have what it takes. And if you lose, then you push yourself to get better. If you want to be the best, then you have to play against the best. And I’m actually a pretty good wrestler. Then again, I ought to be. I’ve been wrestling all my life.

The schools I attended didn’t have wrestling, but even if they did, I’m not sure that my mom would have let me do it. So, I found other ways to get my fix. In elementary school, I wrestled my friend SW. And even though he dropped kicked me into a window sill and fractured my skull, I still got the better of him in the end.

In high school, I wrestled my friend CC every chance I got. And even though he was bigger and stronger than me, I was fast, scrappy, and good at escaping. I never lost. I even wrestled my girlfriend KE, although I admit that I often lost to her, mostly because I was distracted by being smashed in underneath her.

In college, I wrestled my roommate JT. And though he was enthusiastic and had a lot of heart, he couldn’t match my physical superiority or experience. I even grappled with my friend JK in my late thirties. He was vastly stronger than I was, outweighing me by 50 pounds of muscle. But it still came to a draw, because I was faster and harder to pin down.

And now, I wrestle with Troy. Not because I like the obvious size and strength advantage, but because I want to pass along my skills. I want him to test himself against me, so he can learn to be a man and realize that he has what it takes. And he’s good, really good. He could polish up his technique; but he’s strong, he has heart, he’s determined and aggressive, he’s fast, and he’s good at escaping. He seems to enjoy it too. I just love sharing one of my passions with him.

Finish Him!

Troy kicked me in the face tonight and busted my nose. He was lying there, and I was checking if his diaper needed to be changed. And he intentionally swung his legs over and kicked me square in the face. It wasn’t an accident. I wasn’t clipped by a wayward foot swinging through the air. It was calculated. And I’m sad to say that my anger got the best of me.

As the blood poured from my face, I was furious. Not because he made me bleed, which is a first, but because he always hits me in the face. Hits me, kicks me, pokes me, slaps me. And he’s gotten more mean and violent about it. I could be having a nice moment with him, and he’ll just haul off and slap me across the face for no reason.

But the worst part is that he’s not upset or remorseful about it. He just laughs. Tonight, he even denied doing it. Point blank lied to me, telling me that he didn’t kick me in the face. So, now he’s not only mean, but a liar too.

I know he thinks he’s playing. I know he’s trying to pit his strength against mine. It doesn’t bother me if he hits me anywhere else. But he always targets the face. Maybe that’s because it bothers me the most, so he gets the biggest reaction from me. But because he thinks it’s funny, and because he’s two and defiant, I can’t rationalize with him to stop. Now, I have to figure out how to get him to own up to it and apologize instead of lying about it.

Mummy Shoes

Every day, Troy comes home with his shoes filled with sand. At first, I was teasing him about whether he left any sand in the sandbox for anyone else. Then, I told him to keep bringing it home, because I was going to save it all and build him a sandbox of his own. Then, I told my wife that I was going to put it into a baggie and send it back to the daycare.

Today, I was pouring the sand out of Troy’s shoe into the corner of the garage where we’ve been collecting it. The sand just kept coming out in a stream. It reminded me of that scene in The Mummy, where Imhotep turns himself into sand and pours himself through the keyhole of the door. It’s just a long, slow waterfall of sand into a pile on the floor. There was so much sand in the shoe that I can’t figure out how there was room for his toes!

How to Cook a Turkey

The daycare asked the kids how they would cook a turkey, if they were in charge of the upcoming Thanksgiving meal. The responses were a bit crazy and out there, but still incredibly cute. This is Troy's response:

Shake the turkey, the rubber turkey.

Cook the turkey on the plate in the microwave. Cook it. It's hot!

Cut the turkey.

Paint the turkey.

Turkey fell in the water! Daddy take the turkey out of the water.

Cook it some more. 

Daddy's gonna eat the turkey. Mommy's gonna eat the turkey and Troy too.

Faster Than a Speeding Shopping Cart

My wife stopped at Whole Foods tonight for groceries. Usually, Troy prefers to run around, play with everything, and be generally curious. Which can make it hard to shop when you have to keep your eye on him every second! But tonight, he asked my wife to get one of the kid’s carts, and more surprising, he asked to ride in it.

The green “car” was decked out with flame decals and a steering wheel, and Troy immediately made himself at home behind the wheel. This was the life…instead of walking to all of the interesting things in the store, he could drive there. As my wife navigated around the bins and up and down the aisles, Troy was steering his car, turning his wheel left and right to indicate which direction he wanted to go.

And now that he was more eye-level with people, he was waving his hand and telling everyone, “Hi!” Smiling at this adorable, friendly two-year old in his little green car, people said hi back to him…or hello, or hey, or howdy. And if they didn’t hear him or chose to ignore him for some reason, then he’d repeat it louder and more emphatically.

As they rolled around to the bread section, Troy noticed some people in the seating area above the pizza and sushi bars…to be clear, it’s two separate bars, not one pizza-sushi place…that would be gross, but I digress. Upon seeing the people sitting and enjoying their dinner or break from work, Troy started waving at them and yelling out, “Hi!” in his sweet, could be heard clear on the other side of the store voice. It was so piercing, that my wife got embarrassed and told him to say it quieter.

Having finished her shopping and safely stowed her groceries in the trunk of the car, something came over my wife. Maybe it was Troy’s good mood, maybe it was the cool weather making her more frisky and alive. Whatever it was, my wife decided to let Troy “drive” the cart around the parking lot. There were relatively few cars out, so they had wide open spaces to open her up! My wife got into full character, giving the souped up sports car realistic engine noises and shaking the basket as it revved with power. When Troy’s delight and excitement had reached full crescendo, she peeled out and took off at a run, pushing the basket and shifting gears as the car neared red line. The smile on Troy’s face lit up the night as he steered around leaves and sticks making an obstacle course on the ground. When they got to the end of the lane, they turned around and raced the other way.

Some amused and entertained onlookers stopped to watch and smile at the sight…perhaps reliving their own youth when imagination and simple things could bring the most joy. Fearing being permanently banned from Whole Foods for misappropriating a shopping cart and fearing giving herself a heart attack, my wife shut down the race car and packed Troy into the real car to head home.

Scissors

Troy came into the kitchen today and said, “Where is it?” I asked him what he was talking about, and he repeated the question, “Where is it?” Then, he added, “I need to fix it.” He walked straight to the last drawer in the kitchen, pulled out the scissors, and he said, “Ah, here they are!”

I immediately got concerned and told him to put the scissors back. He said, “I need to fix it, dada.” I asked him what he needed to fix, and he pointed to the string hanging from his sleeve. “That.” So, I took the scissors and cut the string. “Thank you, dada.”

I’m amazed that he recognized the string and that it needed to be removed. I’m amazed that he realized the tool he needed to accomplish the task was the scissors. I’m amazed that he knew where to find them, because he’d watched us get them. I’m amazed that he felt confident enough to try to use the scissors to cut the string off his shirt. He would have done it too, if not for the fact that it was up under his armpit and not conveniently located.

The Houston Connection

We went to Houston to visit my grandmother over the weekend. She had never met Troy, so we decided to take him down to see her while he stood could. It was a long drive, and Troy did not like having to sit still in the car that long. He was antsy and kept asking to get out, so he could walk around. Knowing that we'd never make it if we had to stop every 15 min to let him run around, we tried our best to distract him. We stayed with my mom on Friday, and needless to say that after four and half hours in the car with a complaining two-year old, my wife and I were glad to finally be there.

The visit with my grandmother was good, although Troy was bored most of the time. We weren't expecting to be there long, so we didn't take any toys with us inside. At first, he was keeping himself entertained by exploring and poking his nose into everything, but eventually he wanted to DO something, so I had to step away to play with him. The most unique thing about my grandmother's house is the mail slot. It was designed with a little door on the outside where the mail can be dropped, and then it slides through the wall and comes out a little door on the inside. So someone can get the mail without ever stepping out of the house.

So, I showed Troy how this worked, and he was immediately captivated with taking mail and dropping it through the slot on the outside and then running inside to open the little door and see it magically appear. For about ten minutes, he was satisfied that dada had provided acceptable entertainment. After that, it just got old. So, I took him for a walk around the neighborhood and over to my old high school. I told him about memories I had of walking down the trail along the ditch behind my grandmother's house, playing soccer on the field behind the high school that is now a parking lot, and eating lunch alone on the steps of the temporary building that was where the newly-rebuilt high school is now located. He didn't seem to care nearly as much as I did and was more interested in the heavy machinery that they were using to do the construction.

We went back to the house and visited a little more before heading out to eat for lunch. I was once again thwarted in my attempt to eat the world's greatest hamburger, as Bellaire Broiler Burger was once again mysteriously closed (the same thing happened the last time I was here three years ago). So, we stopped at Blood Bros. BBQ, got a to-go order, and took it to the park to enjoy the gorgeous day. After a short romp in the park to try to wear Troy out, we loaded ourselves back in the car and headed home.

On the way, we decided to stop at Bucky's in Madisonville to get gas and stretch our legs. I knew Troy would enjoy seeing the "giant beaver" since there was a giant beaver character in one of the short films he enjoys watching on YouTube. I was right, and we had to take a prerequisite picture with the bronze statue on the sidewalk. Then, it was back in the car to complete our trip. Luckily, Troy dozed for a little while on the drive, so we only had to entertain him part of the way home. All in all a good trip, if not exhausting from all of the driving.

Talk to the Hand!

We went and got Cane’s Chicken Fingers for dinner tonight. As we pulled away from the drive-thru, Troy asked for some French fries. My wife gave him two, and he practically inhaled them before asking for some more. This process repeated all the way home. After he’d eaten some fourteen French fries in a matter of two minutes, I exclaimed, “What are you doing over there, hoovering them down?!”

To this Troy responded by raising his left hand in front of my face and said, “Shush!”

Affronted by being told off by a cheeky two-year old, I said, “Don’t you shush me!”

To which he raised his hand again and said, “Shush, dada! Shush!” Then, he took the French fries from my wife’s outstretched hand and happily munched them in front of me.

Tattle Tell - The Shoe Is on the Other Foot

My wife had taken the day off today, so we both went to get Troy from the daycare. On the way home, I reached back and was ticking his leg while he ate his carrots. Almost immediately he said, “Mama! Mama! Dada is tickling me! Don’t tickle me, dada.” To which I replied, “I can’t believe you ratted me out to your mama! So not cool.”

I guess this is what I get for having no sympathy when he did it to my wife. At least he gives us both the same treatment.