Diary of a SAHD: Crazy crap my kid says.

Jun22

A while back, when Frank started talking, I started jotting down some of his more memorable observations. It’s been almost a year since the last installment of Frank’s musings. His vocabulary has grown, as has his southern accent, and his saltiness. Those damn kids at pre-school!

Anyway, the following is what I have culled from the list and feel can be printed on this semi-family friendly blog.

Enjoy.

How’s that sound good.

This is what he says when he’s trying to make deals; either to go outside, stay up late, or watch TV. You have to say that just as you read it. It’s not a question and there is no pause between sound and good. When Frank says it, it’s purely a statement.

We can’t play tennis, we don’t have our bellies.

This might be my favorite. We went to a local par 3 golf course instead of our normal track and there was a tennis court off to one side. A couple of older, very overweight lads were “playing” tennis with their shirts off, and they really should not have had their shirts off. We finish our round and are heading to the car when Frank decides he wants to play tennis. We walk down to the court where he thinks some rackets may be and says, “We can’t play tennis Daddy. We don’t have our bellies.” Took me a second to catch on to Frank’s drift because we saw the Hefty Brothers almost two hours ago.

Look daddy, I’m flying converted!

I take it back, this is my favorite. Frank was flying one of his planes around the house and turned it upside down. I looked and just said, “Hey Frank you’re flying inverted.” He looked at me and moved on, unimpressed with my aerodynamic knowledge. On his second pass through the kitchen he says. “Look daddy, I’m flying converted!” Not sure if he’s referring to his plane or he’s given up on being a Presbyterian already.

I hit it farther than you!

This was a constant theme on our last foray to the golf course. Highly inaccurate, he only hit it past me once. But he trashed talked me the entire 18 holes.

No, those are your friends, I can’t like them.

A few friends of mine helped me rebuild my deck. The day we started I told Frank he could help. When he came into the back yard he turned around and headed back for the garage. He said he couldn’t help because those were my friends and he couldn’t like them.

I have a small penis!

Ah, with potty training comes awareness. We brought this on ourselves I think. Tracy taught him the proper names for stuff, like she was taught, instead of letting him learn it on the street like I was taught. So we get “I have a small penis!’ Shouted with exuberance and pride. And of course since he’s very literal, he equated the size of each penis to the size of each person. From that we got a 4 year old marching into the living room to declare that he has a small penis, mommy has a bigger penis, and daddy has the biggest penis.

Look, I’m not wild about him chucking the word penis around, but I’m not one to argue with perfectly valid facts.

Daddy you’re a dick.

He chucked this gem out at the dinner table. He’s probably not wrong but I knew he had no idea what he was saying. In fact we had him repeat it about 5 times and we’re still not sure that’s what he said. I can tell you he did not learn that from me. That is not one of my normal epithets.

This may be one of the few times we can honestly say he got that from the school yard. When he starts using the “F” word properly in a sentence as either a noun, verb, adverb, or adjective, or all four at once, then you know he’s repeating something from me.

I guess it runs in the family.

My Daughter- “I got your back Frank.” BOOM!

Diary of a Stay at Home Dad: Two of them? Really?

Jan20

So most or maybe some of you know we are having twins. If you didn’t know, well, we are having twins. Read about it here, 2nd Heartbeat. When we had Frank we waited to find out his gender until he was born. It was going to be a little surprise. It was such a surprise in fact that when they finally cut Frank out of the sun roof (c-section) the doctor didn’t say anything. He was mute in-part because Frank was not breathing and was gray as ash, or whatever a good example of bad gray is. They got Frank breathing in about 2 minutes and the nurse said to the doc, “Well what is it?” He replied, “It’s a baby, what do you think it is?” Love that guy. He or his cohort will be delivering Frick and Frack.

Well finding out we were having twins was enough of a surprise so we decided to find out the sex of these two as soon as was physically possible. In this case, since Tracy is still considered a high risk pregnancy we might find out by the 16 week mark. I think the norm is around the 20 week mark. Tracy is currently getting an ultra-sound about every 3-4 weeks.

We went in for said ultra-sound at the 13 week mark. This was just to check the little carbon copies out, take some measurements and what not. All was well. That is until the ultra-sound tech said “Oh look at that.” Look at what? “Baby A doesn’t appear to have too much bone density around the pelvic area if you know what I mean.” No I do not know what you mean, is this bad? No it was not bad unless we were dead set against girls. The tech was trying to say there was no support structure for male parts, indicating Baby A was a girl. It never occurred to me to look for what wasn’t there. I was solely concentrating on looking for the carrot and peas. That’s why she’s the pro.

She gave the old caveat of it’s only 13 weeks, can’t be sure, don’t quote me, I’ve been wrong before, we’ll know better at the 16 or 20 week check, blah, blah, blah. A quick pass over Baby B’s nether region first indicated a boy but it was really tough to get a good look, so nothing definitive. Again this ultra-sound was not for finding the sex of the Bobbsey Twins. However, I concluded Baby A must be a girl because she was hogging the ultra-sound camera and even gave a little Miss America wave.

Baby A. She's just relaxing and waving to the crowd.

So we went home, waiting for the 16 week ultra-sound to find out if Frank would be out numbered. I had grown up out numbered so I know it’s not a big deal. My little sister, Kathy, and I used to watch Sunday Night Wrestling at the Spectrum in Phila. on that old cable channel called Prism, we bare knuckle fought all the time, and had some of the greatest badminton matches in the history of the sport, followed by some of the greatest victory laps around the back yard by me.

It would certainly be easier with two more boys. We have a bunch of clothes already, the toys are sort of male specific, but probably not too much, and ultimately I was hoping for two more since I was staying home with them. You know you always get the question, “What are you hoping for?” Well I have long hated the answer, “I just hope they’re healthy.” Well who doesn’t hope for that? I mean has anyone ever said, “I’m really hoping for gills and a dorsal fin cause we’re gonna name him Flipper.” So the healthy thing is a universal given. I answer questions put to me, and my answer was 2 boys.

The gleeful taunts to my answer were amazing. There were several variations but all boiled down to “You’re going to have two girls, ha ha.” I just wonder what would have been the response had I said, I’m hoping for two girls. I doubt it would have been the gender biased retorts I’ve been getting. Now let me say, this excludes my family. I have 5 sisters and 2 brothers. Of the 9 grandkids we have produced, all but one have been boys. The family was getting pretty lopsided. Even my father is hoping for 2 girls.

Well pop you get your wish. The week 16 ultra-sound showed a definitive girl for Baby A and almost a definitive girl for Baby B. So unless her B’ness grows a pencil between now and week 20, we need to come up with another girls name.

As my sister Mary Grace, the lone producer of the female grandchild Meghan said, “Girls do play golf you know.” Right you are Mare. Even a good friend who knows about these things told me college scholarships for women’s golf go unused, so if she, or they, are any good and the earth is still spinning on it’s axis in 18 years, they have a good shot of going to college for free. So I got that going for me.

Meghan, hang tight girl. Help is on the way.

Diary of a Stay at Home Dad: Out of the mouth of babes!

Jan16

So it turns out kids say the wackiest things. Well, actually, a lot of the time they are just repeating some of the wacky things they hear. And let me tell you, Frank hears some wacky things around here. Wether it’s Tracy yelling unmentionable things at the TV while her beloved Kentucky Wildcats are under-performing, or me just basically talking how I normally talk. However, every once in a while they uncork a gem of their own. Below is a mixture of the two instances, with a brief explanation of the context in which Frank made the remark.

“We are missing one mommy.” This after coming into the kitchen and seeing me and Grammy (Tracy’s mom) talking with no sign of his mother.

“Frank has little tummy, daddy has big belly.” Note the descriptor change to belly when describing my gut. We were comparing tummies while putting on his PJ’s.

“Penis! That’s my penis daddy!” Yes Frank, yes it is. This occurred first during a diaper change. I believe Grammy is the guilty party who taught Frank the correct name for his body parts.

“Hungry, Hungry.” with a short southern pause between the “Hun” and the “gry.” Got this after he first learned to speak. It first occurred at 3 in the morning and in fact he was hungry as he ate a banana and a bowl of yogurt then promptly returned to bed.

“Daddy on potty, daddy on potty ha ha ha. Bye bye Daddy.” After he learned how to open and close doors on his own, bursting into the throne room that was occupied by me.

“Ta Dah” followed by a bow the most flamboyant broadway actor would envy. He does this after playing something on his little key board, drum, or guitar, or after he’s knowingly done something he should not have and is attempting to avoid a spanking.

“Nose broken!” After a stuffed nose woke him up in the middle of the night.

“I’m going to big bed.” Dragging his blanket, his binker, and Lenny the Lamb down the hall to our bedroom at 3:00am after I asked him where he was going. Why does this always happen in the 2 to 4 am hours?

“Missed the potty daddy, missed the potty.” By several yards Frank, considering you are standing in the bath tub.

“I put a steamer in bath mommy.” After his mother asked him what all the fuss was about up stairs. I have referred to the contents of his diaper as a steamer* once, maybe twice.

It strikes me that I’m going to be talking to a lot of teachers and principals during Frank’s early school career. Just have to figure out who I’m going to blame for a lot of what he says.

* The “Steamer” derives it’s name from the steam emanating from a #2 left in the snow or freezing cold by a dog. I think it was a dog. Some of my northeastern friends will have to weigh in on this. I imagine the Urban Dictionary might have several definitions, most of which probably can’t be printed here.