Kicking my Foot

Brody learned something new today. He told us if someone is not telling the truth, you can say "Are you kicking my foot?" I looked at him and asked "Do you mean 'pulling my leg'?" "Ohhhh", says Brody. "Botched cliche" says Dada.

Boys.

When Brody was three, he would get exasperated when I couldn't separate the superheroes into categories by... I don't even know what to call it.  Universes?  Spiderman goes with Marvel, Superman with DC Comics.  Ironman was in the Avengers, Wonder Woman was a Super Friend.  I grew up in the '80s just like Dada, but he is a boy and he knows these things.  I'm a girl.  Give me time.  I'll figure out how to parent boys, but I need time to catch up.

I finally get a grasp on the superheroes and Logan comes along with his own favorites and new categories.  Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles- I can do that.  I remember them.  But Star Wars?  Transformers?  Voltron?  Come on, boys.  I'm a girl.  I'm trying, but there are just so many.

Tonight as I'm putting Logan to bed, he asks me why his Voltron toy is with the Transformers.  Because while the four lions come together to form a transformer-like robot called Voltron, they are not Transformers.  I know this.  I don't know names, but I know that Voltron and the Transformers are different.  Voltron has pilots and... flying lions, I think?  Transformers are aliens who look like robots and then transform into cars, or planes, or dinosaurs.  Autobots  = good.  Decepticons = bad.  I'm trying, but sometimes I feel like I need a cheat sheet.  Or I should start writing clues on my hands so when the boys ask, I can answer correctly without them sighing and going to ask Dada.

Kids are supposed to think their parents know everything... at least when they're 5 and 3, they should.  Mine have no such illusions.  When it comes to their world of "cool", they know how very little I know.  But I'm trying.  And hopefully that's what matters most.

Kicking it old school

99 Red Balloons

As a young kid, one of my first memories was dancing to 99 Red Balloons in the Hesselgrave's living room with my friends Kim and Amy and their parents. I was five or six years old and hadn't heard the song before but decided I loved it. Tonight I heard 99 Red Balloons on the radio on my way home and couldn't help but sing along and dance in my seat. It made me smile at the memory and ponder the music I dance to with my boys now. Will they remember dancing in the kitchen with me and Dada? Someday will they hear Ho Hey or Gangnam Style come on the radio and smile at the memory? I realized I may need to choose songs with more staying power so tonight I chose some classics and put on Call me Al and of course, 99 Red Balloons. The boys weren't into it, so I switched to Call Me, Maybe. And we danced. Oh well, if their memory is dancing with Mama to bad music, so be it. At least we're dancing.

Things I never thought I'd have to say...

"We don't pick each other's noses."

"Stop eating your shoe and eat your pizza."

"Candy Legos don't work as well as regular Legos."

"We don't drink out of the trash can."

"Are you pretending Chewbacca is poop?"

Call me, Mamie

Logan, singing Carly Rae Jepson's "Call me, maybe":

"And all the other boys
Try to chase me,
here's my number
So call me, Mamie."

College

Brody likes talking about all of the schools he'll attend. Today, as we drove past his elementary school, he started telling me about college. When he goes to college, he's going to sleep there, he tells me. He'll have his own bookshelf full of books and it'll have his name on it. If it's far away and he wants to read a book, he'll just walk over and quietly get a book and take it back to his seat to read. He isn't going to get to see Dada and me every day, but we can come to his school on "special days" like when there is a party in his classroom. :) I'll have to remind him of this conversation later in life. What college kid wouldn't want to have his mom visit for parties?