The Katie Chronicles: Break Like the Wind Edition

You know how ongoing family jokes get started in odd, offhand ways? I think that happened tonight. In an effort to pry our kids away from screens, we've been playing a lot of games with them in the evenings. A family favorite is Uno. In one of tonight's hands, poor Katie kept having "draw" cards played against her, so she ended up drawing about 10 cards in a row, without getting to play any. When Jerome played the last "draw 4" card against her, she simultaneously let out a toot and expressed her mock outrage. "Daddy!" she said. "Don't make me fart in anger!" The table erupted in giggles and a joke was born. 

So, if you come to our house, be warned. If you don't play nice, Katie may tell you off in a memorable way. Let's hope she doesn't go into politics...although it would make those debates more interesting. 

The Katie Chronicles, the Birds and the Bees and the Horses Edition

Recently, I accompanied Katie's Girl Scout troop on a trip to Cumberland Island. Cumberland is one of Georgia's barrier islands on the Atlantic coast and is quite beautiful (I highly recommend a visit if you're near Savannah or Jacksonville, FL). One of the things it's known for is wild horses -- technically, feral horses -- that populate the island. During our visit, the troop hiked out to the ruins of a mansion built by the Carnegie family and we were breaking for lunch, so Katie and I had a chance to chat. We found a picnic table that was away from the group and watched the horses while we ate. There were no foals that we saw but Katie began asking about the horses having babies. We had a wide-ranging discussion with a lot of questions about identifying mares and stallions, how to tell if a mare is expecting, and so on. I ended up explaining in the briefest terms how horse babies are made. Katie became fascinated by the relationship between the mother and father horse (or dam and sire for you horse folks). Katie seemed bothered by the idea of the single mother horses and the deadbeat dad horses.

"So they get together, have horse sex, and....?" she asked. 

"Yes," I said. "The dad goes on his way while the momma raises the baby." 

"That's just rude," says Katie.  "They should at least date before they have a baby together." 

Of course, a discussion of horse marriage ensued but we reached no conclusions about how to solve the challenges of single motherhood in the horse community before it was time to move along on our hike. Perhaps  we'll solve that on another visit.

The Katie Chronicles: The Great Sushi Debate Edition

Once a week, I am lucky to be able to eat lunch with Katie at her school and usually it's just the two of us.  While the point of lunch is quality mother-daughter time, it is occasionally enlightening (and amusing) to listen in on Katie's conversations with her friends, so recently I allowed her to bring over a friend to our table.   Last week, part of the conversation involved Katie and her friend debating the merits of grocery store sushi versus restaurant sushi. (Yes, these are 9 year olds.  I can't remember what I was debating at 9 -- Ear piercing? Nancy Drew books? -- but Japanese cuisine wasn't it.) The discussion centered on cost (grocery store) versus quality (restaurant) and the girls seemed to come down on the side of the grocery store because you can get "more for your money" there.  I don't know whether to be happy that Jerome and I are instilling values of frugality or perplexed about Katie liking the fake crab stuff.   I think I'll go with happy that the child who refused to eat even one molecule of green vegetable between the ages of two and three is finally broadening her culinary horizons.

The Katie Chronicles: Party Like it’s 1998 Edition

As I’ve gotten older, I find I care less and less about being cool.  Having kids and general adult life fills my brain with so much to keep up with that there’s no room left to worry about what’s cool.  And I’m OK with that.  In fact, sometimes I revel in it.  Jerome and I have a couple of holiday parties to attend this week, and last night Katie asked me before we left what we would be doing at the party we were going to. I told her we’d be eating a nice dinner and talking.  She looked at me like I’d sprouted snakes for hair and said, “I thought you said it was a party.”  I assured her that it was actually a party but she continued to look at me skeptically.  I asked her what she thought a party was and she said, “Playing games, dancing, having fun!”  I told her that sitting around, talking, and eating is how adults have fun.  She said, “Really?”  Yes, really.  Then she gave me the old “OK, if you say so Mom but whatever” look that parents know so well.  So yes, I’ve fully arrived in the Land of the Uncool and I’m fine with that.  Dancing and games sound exhausting, anyway.    #DontRaiseTheRoof #ThisPartyIsOnTheHook

The Katie Chronicles: Persuasion Edition

Katie and her best friend go to the same after school care but they don't go to the same school. They have an intensely close friendship in only the way that elementary school girls seem to have. So weekend play date requests are common, as are sleepover requests, but we often can't say yes to the sleepover requests. We usually don't allow her to be away when Ethan is here because we don't see him every weekend and we also have the normal amount of commitments at church, Girl Scouts, and so on. As a result, Katie knows she sometimes has a steep hill to climb on the way to yes, so she's grown more sophisticated with her requests lately. Here's how Saturday's request went. "Mommy, you've been away all week and I know you and Daddy haven't had much time to spend together. I thought I'd go to Isabella's for a sleepover so you guys can have some quality time together. How does that sound?" I think it sounds like my 9 year old has a future in marketing, law, politics, hostage negotiation....or anything else that requires her to persuade others to do what she wants.

The Katie Chronicles: A Good Man is Hard to Find Edition

Katie and I were on our way home after I picked her up today and we were having one of our usual conversations in the car. I told her that her daddy had given his permission to accept a sleepover invitation she had received for this weekend. The invitation was up for debate because this Sunday is Jerome's birthday and we didn't want it to interfere with celebrating his day, but he gave the OK.  She expressed her happiness and we moved on to other topics. Then there was a thoughtful silence from the backseat, followed by, "I just love Daddy. He's loving, awesome, and he's an understander." I agreed that he's awesome and then asked her what she meant by "understander." She said, "He listens really well and understands you." I agreed with her. Finding a good listener is hard under any circumstances but also finding one with all the qualities you want in a husband and father is rarer still. Katie has a great dad and I'm glad she's an "appreciator" of his finer qualities.  

The Katie Chronicles: Information Update Edition

I had to take Katie to school this morning and after I got to work, I noticed that I had a backseat passenger. When I asked after work if this was my grandchild, I ended up learning a lot. Katie informed me that she's only going to give birth once because she's "only having s-e-x one time" when she's grown up so my passenger, Fiona, is my oldest granddaughter. I also learned that I also have three other, non-s-e-x produced grandchildren. They currently live with us and are named Rachel, Gracie, and Sophia. All in all, it's been a very informative evening.