Tidy Husband

Eligible for the seniors discount and the Happy Meal deal at the same time.

  1. Welcome Back Carson

    The terrible two are back at it.

    Carson is back.

    Photo by Lanju Fotografie on Unsplash

    I came home and found these two in the front lawn chomping away on popsicles so I am assuming that Carson’s grounding is over too after the great debacle.

    But now they are up to their same old tricks. After they finished their popsicles they wanted to come inside and play. NO. That’s a hard no too. It’s sunny and almost 80 degrees outside - you have a playground, scooters, bikes and imagination - go use them.

    Then I went back to doomscrolling on my phone. I lead by example.

    They are sneaky though. If they can’t get inside here then they go and try Carson’s house. I doubt his Mom is thrilled at having one kid leave the house and then have another one come back, but it must have worked because they were gone after that.

    After about a half an hour I started to walk to get my charge when she turned the corner and was skipping down the street.

    “Did Carson’s Mom tell you to go home?, I asked.

    “Yup”, she chirped.

    I told her that is the way you are supposed to do things. This is a lot easier than having to have week of no fun.

    She then said “Hey Dad! Can you do this?” and then proceeded to twist her body in some way I don’t know I would ever get back up from.

    “Uh…no.” I told her.

    “How about this?”

    Still No.

    “This?”

    Nope.

    She then gave up on me and my physical ability and then skipped home for dinner.

    After dinner we even had more physical activity where we played soccer in the front yard with the entire family for a good half an hour, and then before you knew it - it was bedtime and here I am writing this before I collapse into bed myself.

    Welcome back Carson, you were missed.

    Until Next Time,

    TH and Co.

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  2. I Have Super Powers

    According to the Child. BW thinks otherwise.

    As all things that happen here, it seems bedtime is the most interesting time of the day.

    Photo by Dev on Unsplash

    That is if you call superpowers being trying to get a six-year-old to bed.

    You see, it’s football Sunday here and BW and the child make a chacuterie board together and then park on the couch and watch. BW does more of the watching and the child does more of the cheese eating.

    They’re a team.

    Right. Bedtime - As usual, things were going great until they were not. She would not brush her teeth because she doesn’t like the toothpaste we have. She wants bubblegum, but we’re sick of having 9 different tubes of toothpaste in a drawer because all of sudden the flavor that was okay last week was “yucky”

    She’s currently rocking just cheap plain toothpaste. No mintl no nothing - just toothpaste. Of course, this too tasted yucky and she was testing boundaries by putting the least amount of toothpaste she could on this brush, and then ever so lightly swiping at her pearly whites.

    “BRUSH!”, BW told her.

    I got down to her level and said to her we’re not doing another thing until you brush your teeth. She cried. I ignored it. I reminded her that dental needles really hurt.

    She then brushed them really hard as a protest but that’s what needed to happen so yay.

    OK…where were we? Oh, right: BED.

    I get her tucked in and pick up about 1000 things off her floor so I don’t kill myself on the way out and then I leave to go grab some clothes to shower. She’s out of bed in seconds flat with the “I’m scared” routine.

    “No you’re not - go to bed”.

    I get her back in bed and I tell her to scooch over and I will sit with her for a minute.

    She tells me she can’t sleep without me becuase I have a superpower.

    “I do?” I ask. “Farting is a superpower”?

    She goes from tears to laughter in 3 seconds and then we talk about how farting would actually be a great superpower to have. Forget flight or fight - just gas the bad guys away! You could even start fires in an emergency!

    This changes the channel enough for the scareds to be forgotten about and then she tells me that my superpower is love and she needs me to be her superhero at bedtime and she can’t sleep without me.

    Yeah….nice try, kid.

    Now, go to bed you little stinker.

    Until Next Time,

    TH and Co.

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  3. If You Go Out in the Woods Today

    You’re in for a lot of whining.

    Photo by Imat Bagja Gumilar on Unsplash

    Parenting Tip of the Day:

    You cannot let the child stay inside all day and watch YouTube videos.

    It’s just not healthy for the child. So after lunch we decided to go for a walk at Devaux Woods Park where I knew they had a relatively new playground so she could go outside and play and climb.

    We got there and she played and climbed for about 15 minutes or so and then the adults decided we wanted to go for a short walk in the wood.

    Cue the feet dragging.

    “I don’t wanna”.

    “I want to stay at the park”

    I. I. I. I.

    I told her that life is not all about you and you’re not the spoiled little princess you think you are and there are sometimes - and some things that you are doing that you don’t want to do. For example: teeth brushing. It’s happening. Twice daily.

    We knew this walk would not be long - we’re talking about a city block around. A mile at most.

    She did not want to go.

    She went.

    When we got to the actual path to the woods - which is just a big circle that dumps us into the parking lot again - there was a sign to beware of coyotes.

    This triggered fear as well as a discussion on coyotes. I tried to convince her that there was a thing called “night bears”, but she’s not buying it

    “They’re not real”, she says to me.

    Then when we were in the woods the complaints continued:

    “It smells weird”, she said.

    It smells like outdoors we tell her. Then we tell her that she should listen to the birds talk to each other

    Because suddenly she knows everything she tells us that birds can’t talk. She’s not wrong but we were going with the talking. They communicate, we tell her.

    “Now, keep walking”, I tell her. “We are going to have a nice walk as a family”, I tell her.

    Not more than 15 minutes our walk is over and the wildest animals we saw were 2 squirrels and a chipmunk. Also, our wild woods backed on to somebody’s backyard so it’s not like we were lost - we were just in the suburbs.

    A few more minutes at the park and then we went to get what is probably our last ice cream out for the summer.

    Oddly enough, there were absolutely zero complaints about the ice cream part of our adventure.

    I don’t know what’s going on, but as soon as she hit first grade there’s been a whole lot of ignoring and not listening and just overall being a little turd. When we got home we told her we’re all going to read books for half an hour. Of course, she stealthily took off looking for her tablet, but Dad took it away for the rest of the day.

    She realized that the tablet was done for the day and eventually got some books and an old cardboard box and some pillows and blankets and was reading to herself for a bit.

    Eventually she realized that what she wanted and what she was getting were two different things, but boy was it a struggle today.

    Until Next Time,

    TH and Co.

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  4. I'm The Man

    I think about you all the time too.

    I’m sure I have written about this before.

    If the child was deserted on a desert island and could only pick one parent to save - I would be it.

    It’s not that Mommy isn’t loved or needed, but if I’m around:

    I am the Man. Full Stop.

    Trouble is, sometimes Dad can’t be the Man. As much as Dad would like to hang round 24/7 sometimes dear old dad has to work or not be at the beck and call of a six-year-old.

    And let me tell you, she’s got me wrapped around her finger. I would move mountains.

    But! We’re trying to get her to realize that I can’t be the chosen one all the time and sometimes Dad can’t be around and she just has to deal.

    Take this morning as an example: I got up before her and went out and uber-ed for a bit in the morning because that’s where the money is. And this morning, she had no problem with the fact that I wasn’t there. I warned her last night that this was going to happen, and I think this is key: She does not like change.

    Take our disaster earlier this week: She was playing and was told to stop and come home.

    And we all know how that turned out.

    Same thing happened tonight: She was so so so tired to the point where she got overtired and then it was a struggle to get her into the PJ’s and teeth brushed. I missed the window of tired and she got too tired. Finally I got her tucked in and turned off the light but that wasn’t working for her.

    She wanted me by her side.

    Meanwhile, Dad is trying to get her to go to bed so he can have an hour in his head to write before he has to go to bed (BTW, while all this was going on - BW was ALREADY in BED. She has no problem with me being the chosen one)

    Cue the Tears. I told her that she just needs to close her eyes, and she doesn’t need one more huggie from Dad.

    “But I think about you all the time!”, she cried. “I neeeeed you”, as she looked up at me with that lower lip fully stuck out in the biggest pout you’ve seen.

    I argued that she just needs to go to bed as she’s been up for 14 hours and had a very, very busy day.

    She just needs to sleep.

    Then I hugged her one more time because I missed the morning one so I figured I owed her one.

    Oh, and Pumpkin? I need you too.

    Until Next Time,

    TH and Co.

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  5. The Apology

    Today started off a bit rough but ended with ice cream and a child that put herself to bed, so I’m calling it a win.

    I slept in.

    Photo by Meg Jenson on Unsplas. You say it first.

    Apparently if you want to get up early and make some money you have to get up to an alarm clocks. Guess who forgot the alarm?

    BW thinks I did it on purpose, but it almost all worked out in the end. First, if I was not home she would not have woke to coffee delivered in bed and bacon sandwiches for breakfast (she had to come downstairs for the bacon)

    The topic of discussion was that the child thought she should run away and so we offered her alternatives like living at a friend’s house or Abuela’s but she realized she’s got it pretty good here even if she is currently under house arrest.

    All was going as planned, until I started to leave the house. The child did not like this at all and there were tears and screaming and clinging to my leg. I fibbed and told her I had a doctor’s appointment but in reality, the school bus was still 45 minutes out and it was prime time for uber-ing. So. I left.

    When she got home from school later today we had a talk about how she’s big and this isn’t how it all goes down. I cannot be around all the time.

    Because she’s still in the doghouse she found some molding clay and some watercolor paints and went to town while I made dinner.

    After dinner we have a new deal: Homework happens before dessert.

    I asked her if she had homework tonight and she told me that yes, she does.

    “They work us hard over there”, she told me.

    But after homework there was just one more thing we had to do.

    We had to write an apology letter for Carson’s Mom for our behavior on Monday night and then walk over and hand deliver it.

    Insert stalling and feet dragging here.

    She wanted to just write “I’m sorry” and that’s it, but BW made her flesh it out a bit more and the final note read:

    “Dear Carson’s Mom.

    I am sorry I misbehaved at your house. “

    And then she wrote her name and BW marched her the two blocks to Carson’s house.

    I did not go, but there was some stalling and feet dragging and when they got there, they knocked on the door - Dad answered - and she handed him the card and ran away.

    I guess that’s good enough, right? We said she had to write a letter and deliver it personally. Nobody said she had to stick around and chat.

    And that ends our week of no fun. We took a day off for being brave enough for actually delivering. It’s hard to apologize.

    When I was putting her to bed she asked me why it is so hard to apologize and I said because it’s admitting you were wrong and nobody wants to make mistakes and be wrong. At least her little mind is thinking about behaving and the right thing to do.

    But, but! I told her that if you apologize that almost anybody will accept your apology and then you can be friends again and all is forgiven.

    Unless you’re Carson: He’s still got 2 more days of his sentence to complete.

    Until Next Time,

    TH and Co.

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