Tag: teachable moments

children, humor, kids, motherhood, parenting

The Teachable Moments

WFAM

ry=400-7I love to watch movies with the boys.  However, it is often difficult to agree on one that we all are willing to watch.  Recently, Mad Dog persuaded me to allow the boys to watch a crazy tornado movie called Into the Storm.  My boys usually do well watching movies geared slightly above their age range.  We use a lot of humor to lighten the drama and it winds up being more comical than scary.

One of the reasons I love to watch movies with them is because they haven’t seen enough to understand obvious plot points.  When I accurately ‘predict’ what is going to happen next, they are amazed.

For instance, Into the Storm had a scene where I correctly predicted that both the characters would live, even though all evidence pointed to the contrary.  To see if Mad Dog was paying attention I said, “You know the hot girl lives.  They always do.”  He said an absentminded, “Yeah.”

Well, at this point, he was totally busted.  I teased him and said, “What?  So you admit she’s hot?”

He was backed into a corner.

As the movie progressed and this girl was in more and more peril, every time she survived, Mad Dog used it as a teaching tool.  “See boys?  See how the hot girl survives everything?  That’s why I married your Mom.  It’s the law of hotness.  I will never die in a storm as long as I’m married to your Mom.”

My prediction?  Mad Dog is safe for a long, long time.

children, mommyhood

All That Manners

WFAM

When I picked up Full Speed from school, he didn’t exactly get a glowing report from his teacher. Apparently there was some sort of scuffle over the ownership of a chair that resulted in him grabbing his classmate and choking the this classmate in anger. So……, what exactly does a Mom say in response to that?

The teacher explained that Full Speed responded to discipline appropriately and quickly doled out the proper apology to his classmate. She said that the ‘angry’ incident wasn’t enough to impact his overall report for the day. He still had received a blue snowflake (red is bad) as his final behavior mark for the day. I left feeling that although Full Speed had acted delinquently, that at least he was a polite delinquent.

Since it was Grandpa’s last night here, T.Puzzle, Full Speed and myself took him out to dinner one more time. I was a little shaken up about Full Speed’s bad report at school and I was feeling less than prepared for dealing with any antics from my boys. When the food arrived and the waiter placed Full Speed’s cheeseburger in front of him, I said, “What do you say, Full Speed?” My hope was to elicit a ‘thank you’ from him. Again, I am trying very hard to raise a polite delinquent. Instead, he shouts, “YAHOO!”

At least the waiter had a sense of humor and cracked a smile. Thankfully, tomorrow will soon be here and is another chance for me to teach my guys manners, reinforce my ‘no-choking’ policy and attempt to always, always, try to find the silver lining in the cracks of this crazy façade we call motherhood.