Little Kids, Big City: Tales from a Real House in New York City (With Lessons on Life and Love for Your Own Concrete Jungle) by Alex McCord, Simon van Kempen
Authors: Alex McCord, Simon van Kempen
Ads: Link
their caregivers, and around the age of three some locals began calling François the Mayor of Cobble Hill.
Sometimes I really wish we had family living near us. Although we schedule regular chats via video with our more technologically advanced relatives, the others miss the day-to-day little things like Johan singing “Hit the Road, Jack,” or an art project the boys created together. It’s also impossible to get Grandma over to babysit if Mom and Dad need to go out for 45 minutes. To that end, we’ve made our own family, whether it’s with childless friends who want to borrow some for an afternoon, or friends who have kids of similar ages and want to get them together for drop-off playdates. When it’s just for an afternoon, four kids can be easier to watch than two, as they have a ball playing and the novelty of being together is fresh.
TOP 10 THINGS CAREGIVERS HAVE INADVERTENTLY DONE TO AMUSE, ANNOY OR THRILL US:
10. Put cheese away in the freezer while talking to the boys.
9. Accidentally used a household cleaning wipe when changing a diaper. Johan did not notice.
8. Let baby François lick the edge of a shot glass of vanilla rum on vacation He wanted more and tried to grab the bottle!
7. Get into our backyard blow up pool fully clothed because she didn’t have a swimsuit
6. Obsessively boil every dish baby Johan used and made François put on gloves when holding him
4. Offered to take the boys out for dinner and asked them where they wanted to go (First mistake.) Our enterprising young men directed him to an upscale French bistro and ordered $60 worth of pasta and hot chocolate. Yes we paid him back.
3. Spent hours helping the boys make homemadeglitter-filled photo collages for Simons and my birthdays—we still have them!
2. Really “get” the working-from-home model, and help enforce it in kid friendly terms
1. When a former caregiver told several neighbor hood parents and nannies that we were awful people unprompted her replacement loyally told everyone the truth and to consider the source
Chapter 7
“Putting To Death Is Not Nice,” a Duet for Two Boys and a Guitar
Lessons Learned by Boisterous Children
Alex
It cracks me up when people expect children to be perfectly well behaved all the time. Quite honestly, why should they be? We adults aren’t. Many adults treat each other horribly on a regular basis, and I would rather have a boisterous boy running around me with a drippy paintbrush, than a superior kid sitting still and saying nasty things about her frenemy. In many ways kids are feral animals, and at the end of each day if there’s no blood and no ruined furniture,
we’ve won.
About four months ago we came home one weekend afternoon to find the boys madly playing their guitars and running around. Our friend and their honorary godfather, Sava, was on the sofa howling with laughter and we eagerly asked him what had happened. Sava said, “François, come and sing your song for Mommy and Daddy.” Both boys happily launched into a song that basically involved screaming, “Putting to death is not nice, killing isn’t good!” over and over while rocking out with their guitars and throwing their heads around. I’m still not sure what inspired the song, although Sava did confirm that nothing had been put to death, but I fully agree that in any case it is not nice. They’ve begun protesting the death penalty early.
The boys understand the basics—i.e., no killing. No breaking things, no punching in the face (unless your brother really, really annoys you). When you get to the finer points of appropriate behavior it’s frustrating to not be able to make yourself understood. We went through a big learning curve when the boys were between two and three years old. Once they are able to communicate with you using words, it’s tough to not open the flood-gates and bombard them with information, but we had to stop ourselves because it just wasn’t sinking in.
Sometimes I really wish we had family living near us. Although we schedule regular chats via video with our more technologically advanced relatives, the others miss the day-to-day little things like Johan singing “Hit the Road, Jack,” or an art project the boys created together. It’s also impossible to get Grandma over to babysit if Mom and Dad need to go out for 45 minutes. To that end, we’ve made our own family, whether it’s with childless friends who want to borrow some for an afternoon, or friends who have kids of similar ages and want to get them together for drop-off playdates. When it’s just for an afternoon, four kids can be easier to watch than two, as they have a ball playing and the novelty of being together is fresh.
TOP 10 THINGS CAREGIVERS HAVE INADVERTENTLY DONE TO AMUSE, ANNOY OR THRILL US:
10. Put cheese away in the freezer while talking to the boys.
9. Accidentally used a household cleaning wipe when changing a diaper. Johan did not notice.
8. Let baby François lick the edge of a shot glass of vanilla rum on vacation He wanted more and tried to grab the bottle!
7. Get into our backyard blow up pool fully clothed because she didn’t have a swimsuit
6. Obsessively boil every dish baby Johan used and made François put on gloves when holding him
4. Offered to take the boys out for dinner and asked them where they wanted to go (First mistake.) Our enterprising young men directed him to an upscale French bistro and ordered $60 worth of pasta and hot chocolate. Yes we paid him back.
3. Spent hours helping the boys make homemadeglitter-filled photo collages for Simons and my birthdays—we still have them!
2. Really “get” the working-from-home model, and help enforce it in kid friendly terms
1. When a former caregiver told several neighbor hood parents and nannies that we were awful people unprompted her replacement loyally told everyone the truth and to consider the source
Chapter 7
“Putting To Death Is Not Nice,” a Duet for Two Boys and a Guitar
Lessons Learned by Boisterous Children
Alex
It cracks me up when people expect children to be perfectly well behaved all the time. Quite honestly, why should they be? We adults aren’t. Many adults treat each other horribly on a regular basis, and I would rather have a boisterous boy running around me with a drippy paintbrush, than a superior kid sitting still and saying nasty things about her frenemy. In many ways kids are feral animals, and at the end of each day if there’s no blood and no ruined furniture,
we’ve won.
About four months ago we came home one weekend afternoon to find the boys madly playing their guitars and running around. Our friend and their honorary godfather, Sava, was on the sofa howling with laughter and we eagerly asked him what had happened. Sava said, “François, come and sing your song for Mommy and Daddy.” Both boys happily launched into a song that basically involved screaming, “Putting to death is not nice, killing isn’t good!” over and over while rocking out with their guitars and throwing their heads around. I’m still not sure what inspired the song, although Sava did confirm that nothing had been put to death, but I fully agree that in any case it is not nice. They’ve begun protesting the death penalty early.
The boys understand the basics—i.e., no killing. No breaking things, no punching in the face (unless your brother really, really annoys you). When you get to the finer points of appropriate behavior it’s frustrating to not be able to make yourself understood. We went through a big learning curve when the boys were between two and three years old. Once they are able to communicate with you using words, it’s tough to not open the flood-gates and bombard them with information, but we had to stop ourselves because it just wasn’t sinking in.
Similar Books
