Battle of Wills

Parenting moments are wonderful. They are full of these battle of wills. If you're a strong-willed person, and especially if your kids' other biological parent is a strong-willed person, it is very likely that you have one helluva strong-willed kid.
Which is kind of a silly statement to make since I firmly believe that most all people would consider themselves strong-willed about one thing or another. I mean, someone comes up to you and asks "May I kill you?" You say "no." They start pestering you about it, asking if you're really sure about that, you hold firm and say "no." ~ See, strong-willed! And the person who gave in and said yes?? Proof of Darwinism or something?? But I digress.

Battle of wills in parenting worlds are amazing. It's amazing what you will lock horns over. What initiates that inevitable Mexican Stand Off.
And these stand offs aren't just any stand off. They're EPIC. Your hold world suddenly is careening out of control as you try to hold your ground on this ONE ISSUE!!!

Today's Battle of Wills is happily brought to you by the most terrifying & trouble-making source in your entire house ..... the toilet.

The toilet is evil. It alone is EPIC. It is Kilimanjaro. It is hundreds of dollars spent on how to use the damn thing. Libraries created for this sole purpose, dolls to re-enact the act, videos to show how happy it is, therapy sessions later to console the now grown child over that horrific time in his life.

My kids will use the toilet. We are past that battle. But Tristan, ahh Tristan, Tristan is locking his horns with me over wiping himself. Tristan, although he desperately wants to be a big boy and do big boy things, is just as desperately clinging to the role of 'baby of the family.' I mean, that's HIS role. It's HIS THING man!!!

And so we stand. Well, actually he's more sitting and I'm standing in the doorway. But we've got our stances wide ala John Wayne, Clint Eastwood, and all other serious guys who are just made for battles of wills and standing their ground.

Tristan refuses to wipe himself. I inform him that he can do it, that I've seen him do it, and so therefore, he can do it again and I will be oh so proud of him for being such a big boy.
He informs he he can't because he thinks he has a little diarrhea. (Yea, I'm writing about this. It's part of being a parent, deal with it)
I check, he doesn't, and so I inform him of this. Then I tell him that even if he DID have it, because he's still insisting that he does, he can still wipe his own butt. It's just the same thing.
He refuses.
I inform him that, fine, he can just sit there all day.

Now here is where my day steps in and says "REALLY????" Because I have somewhere I have to be at 1pm. And even though this battle of wills started at noon the countdown is louder than ever in my head.
The errand I need to run is literally a block away. I could literally be back in approximately 5 minutes.
Do I leave him here, sitting on the toilet?? I mean, if he's on the toilet, what could happen to him?? He decides to wipe and get off the toilet?? He decides to rub the nasties all over the wall?? A kid-eating alligator suddenly comes up from the pipes and snatches him, butt unwiped and all from the toilet, dragging my poor baby down into the depths of the sewer never to be heard from again (but sure to live on in infamous lore)???
Should I leave the 7 year old here with him? Well, that would be an obvious yes. Just in case that alligator showed up.
I could just wipe him, but then he knows I can be waited out till he gets his way. And let's face it, he's just sitting there.

So, I think fast. The dog loves to check on Tristan so I put the dog in the bathroom with him. That should get him wanting to leave the toilet!!!
Of course the dog isn't willing to cooperate and doesn't see what epic proportions this battle has reached. He is more interested in the peanut butter & jelly sandwiches and the fresh loaf of bread that are all sitting on the kitchen counter. He sits at the bathroom door and whines to be let out.
Instead of Tristan screaming about Foster being near him he is hollering at me that Foster wants out.
Cussing under my breath (that's a change for the better there folks, isn't it??) I let the dog out.

Time is ticking away. I have no allies to call in. I go back in there, leaning against the towels several feet away from him. I explain the process once more. I refuse to do it for him. I assure him that he can do it.

And he does.

I emerge from the bathroom exhausted. It could've been days, time has come to a stand still. The clock that has been so loudly ticking down has suddenly stopped like the bombs in the movie with 2 seconds left before life as we know it is over.

The war of the toilet is not over. But today's battle has been won. I have earned another parenting medal and my child has earned another badge of honor: he can do it and I can let him do it. We are both winners.

It was epically awesome.

Why are you shocked?

A local incident has gathered nationwide media attention when a young girl went missing recently. She was safely found on the opposite coast. When she went missing Amber Alerts went out and her photo went up. She is 12 and looks much older. A lot of people have started talking for that reason. They are shocked.

I am NOT writing about just this girl in general here. I am deliberately not using her name for that very reason. This is by no means commentary on this personal girl. It is just something that many people are aware of and talking about & so it brings up the issue of young girls looking much older than they are.

And, in talking about it recently, someone asked me "Why would a 12 year old girl want to look 18?" ~ Obviously, a guy asked me this. If you're a female you've already responded "Why WOULDN'T they?!?"

Generations of women will attest to attempts to look older. The desire to actually be older. I'm sure generations of men will as well, but it is the females I'm talking about here.
I know I did. However, since my mother is known to read this, I will spare details to cover my own, now-grown hide.

What makes it all so shocking though is how very "grown-up" girls today now look. And by that I mean that they are oozing sexuality. And not in the good, wholesome kinda way. In the "how much for an hour" kinda way. I'm sure to some extent adults have always said this about younger generations, but it seems more prevalent now. Why??

Hmm .. good question. Let's think on that. What could POSSIBLY be giving these girls the idea that looking like whores is good? Hmm ....

This is 'Red Riding Hood Barbie.' I don't know about you, but this isn't what I remember Red Riding Hood looking like!! YIKES!!! I'm pretty certain that wolf there has money in his hand.

Don't get me wrong though, I'm not laying the blame completely at Barbie's 4" ho heels.

What I am saying is that if you give your children toys to play with and those toys look like street-walkers, then don't be shocked if your children grow up looking like street-walkers too. If you let them play video games full of violence, trampy looking female characters, and so on .. don't be surprised when the kids grow up desensitized to violence and without healthy perspectives of how adults should look .. much less act. If you buy them clothes that don't cover their bodies properly ~ and I'm not talking about anything too prudish here when I say properly, I'm saying more along the lines of 'ass not hanging out' kind of properly ... well, duh .. you're kids are gonna look like whores. Or at least people are going to likely think so.
If you raise your kids thinking you have a great relationship with them and you're judging that based on the fact that y'all are "best buds" .. well, then you're very misguided and don't be so shocked when your child tries to act like an adult rather than a child.

The responsibility lies with the parents. Sure, kids will still do things that we tell them not to, often simply because we tell them not to. But, you still have to do your job as a parent. Especially while they're still young enough that you can control most the things they do & see.

So .. why are you so shocked?

Surpises & Slow Food

Well, today turned out to be quite a shocker! We had originally planned to go camping this weekend since the game wasn't being televised ~then along came Hannah and much-needed rain. So, no camping. We decided instead to go pick up some chicken feed, as well as some straw, and move the tractor to the coop so that the gals could go inside and (hopefully) use the nest box for laying. We know the gals should begin laying anytime now & this would buy us some time until we build a nest box onto the tractor itself.

We were getting into the car when I heard it: a very faint crowing. As I've stated before, we live in "the City" and no-one nearby has chickens. Which means, if it is crowing it is our chickens. Apparently, what we thought was an Easter Egg hen turned out to be an Easter Egg Rooster!! We ran and got the feed, then came home and took care of the rooster. It was somewhat ironic as this was the only bird I had really named, and it was one of our prettier birds, I thought. Plus, the idea of getting blue & green eggs had really begun to grow on me, so that was a bit of a bummer. On the plus side though, we're now back up to 4 meat birds (since we still have 3 Speckled Sussex we're letting fatten up), and that is good. We cooked it for dinner and it was very tasty!! If you're going to eat meat, pasture raised is the way to go!

As the dinner was cooking, we all went out to begin work on the coop and tractor. Some re-figuring needed to be done, a wall taken out of the garden, and so on. As Justin was getting the hay, I walked over to the tractor to get ready to move it. Imagine my amazement to see a little egg there!! A friend told us that the first time her rooster crowed, the hens began laying the next day -- apparently that is a good indicator!

While we don't believe in "washing" the eggs (they are laid with a protective barrier that is removed when they are washed, leaving them vulnerable to bacteria), this one was pretty darn muddy, so I quickly & gently rinsed it off with my hands.
Shannon was particularly impressed with the whole thing. He has always loved going to get eggs from our friends' coop, and today he even carried a chicken (a Cochin, of course!) from the tractor to the coop! We were able to get him to eat all of his dinner by promising that, if he did, he could go out and look to see if the girls laid anymore eggs this evening. They hadn't, but tomorrow is another day and I am sure we'll be out there quite often!
Speaking of dinner: we were able to have a complete Slow Food meal, most of it local! We had the chicken/rooster (or Eugenie, since that had been it's wrongly-sexed name), some chili that I made with organic dry beans bought at the co-op and tomatoes we got at the Farmer's Market, topped with raw milk garlic-colby cheese!! What a fantastic feast!!

The cheese we bought from a local farmer-friend, but it did have to cross state lines to get here so I suppose it isn't truly local. But, still, raw milk cheese from pasture raised & organic cows!! DELIGHTFUL!
I know to some of you it must seem odd that I can type about killing a named bird and cooking it for dinner (and then show a photo to boot!). While I repsect everyone's right to choose what is right for themselves and their family, we have that right as well. We don't kill what we don't need. We make sure our food, when it was alive, led the type of lives animals were meant to live. With our chickens, we've even taken the step to raise heritage and rare breeds, trying to help ensure that these breeds aren't wiped out.
It is truly the deepest feeling of satisfaction to know the life our food lived, to know that not only were they happy but they're healthier for us to eat and significantly so! To know that I can fix my children a meal made from these things makes me feel like I have succeeded. And, too often, like most parents I assume, I tend to feel like a failure as a parent. To know that the food my kids eat (or a majority of it) is some of the best and healthiest food they can ever possibly hope to eat, well, it is a primal goal that we have accomplished. It leaves me content to the very core of my being.