The Water War Continues

Remember me writing about the water fights that are constantly going on in my house? Well, apparently the stakes have been raised… to ice…

I’m sitting in bed surfing the net and watching reruns of The Big Bang Theory, when the house starts shaking with the stampeding of Mr. Gameboy’s feet. Oh, no, he’s retreating from some form of attack on BoogerFace.

He runs into the bedroom and slams the door, locking in. He’s panting, grinning, and giggling… this can’t be good.

“Whatcha doing?” I ask him casually.

“Haha, I got him. I poured a cup of ice and water over his head in the bathtub!”

I shake my head, “Mean daddy!”

Fastforward 30 minutes… BoogerFace is in his pajamas, ready for bedtime. Mr. Gameboy is in the shower. Payback time.

“Ok, Booger, let’s pour some ice on daddy!”

BoogerFace laughs in excitement and we race to the kitchen to prepare for invasion. He grabs a cup, but I have bigger ideas for the mean daddy.

I find an empty gallon bucket and dump a bunch of ice in it, followed by water. BoogerFace is in shock, but soon joins in the scheme.

On second thought, one bucket is not enough… Mr. Gameboy needs some serious payback for picking on my sweet little baby. He will be sorry…

After filling the second bucket, we head into the steamy bathroom, and pull up the step ladder, blocking the shower door from being opened.

Mr. Gameboy hears us, and laughs, fully expecting a cup of ice to the face.

Imagine his squeal when he sees a BUCKET of ice cold water being tossed over the shower stall…

And the bellow of outrage of a second bucket being poured over his head…

Yes, revenge is sweet, sweet, sweet.

And, so, the water war continues.

I hope I can remember to lock the bathroom door from now on…

Glowing Bath Water

Image credited to Julia Galdo

Need a new twist at bath time? We tried this and it was awesome! Get some glow sticks, fill the tub, and turn out the lights… instant fun!

What was good about this? BoogerFace’s eyes lit up with excitement and that made my day. I was the best mommy in the world for about 5 minutes there…

What went wrong? He got scared of the dark (even with the glow). After a few minutes he wanted to make necklaces and bracelets out of the glow stick instead of playing with them in the water…

What can I say? My son is a diva.

Water Fights

Imagine this: sitting on the back deck with your significant other at dusk, enjoying the cooling of the evening. Exchanging witty banter back and forth. Out comes a sweet little 6-year old boy, looking innocent. Too innocent.

At this point you meet his gaze and your eyes sweep downward to his hands, or lack there of. They are behind his back. This is not good.

The sweet innocence on his face transforms with a devious grin and narrowed eyes.

Slow motion. The arms draw around to his front. Gripped in his little fist is the orange and yellow barrel of a water gun. Not a little water gun, but one that he has to use two hands to simultaneously pump and shoot.

This is the scene that I was facing the other night.

“You better not!” I squealed.

My husband, faster on the uptake with more battle experience under his belt in water game warfare, jumped to his feet and grabbed the water pistol that was sitting on the patio table.

“No, my cellphone!” I pocketed the device before it could get wet.

Just in time… the stream of water hit my arm and splattered across my chest.

Mr. Gameboy (the sexy husband protecting my honor) pulled the trigger and pumped the barrell rapidly, soaking BoogerFace’s shirt and pants. Water dripped from his brow.

And this is how it started… the fully-clothed water gun fight.

Credited to MorgueFile.com

One thing that I have learned living with these two boys is that I have to be prepared at all times for things like this.

This is not the only time, nor will it be the last I’m sure. Sometimes it’s not a water gun. Sometimes it’s the water hose. Or water balloons. Or the water from the bathtub. Or a cup of ice. Or a pair of dirty underwear…

And who would I be not to mention the random wrestling matches as well? Mr. Gameboy and BoogerFace will pounce on one another, trying to use both tact and the art of surprise to overthrow the other. I become the referee… or the tag-team partner… or the wrestling mat…

This is my life!

Get Your Child To Eat More!

If your child is like mine, dinner time is always a fight! He doesn’t want to try this vegetable or that meat. He doesn’t want cheese on it. There’s a grain of pepper on the egg. The hotdog is too brown. The mac ‘n cheese is too cheddar-y. The blueberries are too cold (“Can we microwave it?” he will ask). This has butter on it. This has salt on it. This doesn’t have salt on it.

To which I always reply, “Eat three more bites or…”

Cue the random whining.

Let me introduce an idea I stumbled upon on Real Simple. Using dice as a vegetable counter… to get your child to eat more…

The idea is that the child can roll the dice and take their chances. The number the dice shows is how many more bites they must take. This is genius.

And, so, I tried it. And it WORKED! Like, seriously, worked. My son was excited that he could roll the dice and have the chance of only having to eat one more bite. He rolled a three. And, to my amazement, he ate all three bites without complaining!

That is an accomplishment for me. I felt like the best, smartest, most pretty mommy in the whole world.

Repeated exposure and a fun, healthy atmosphere seems to do wonders. A child has to decide whether or not they are going to eat, but parents can decide what to put in front of them. Even if they don’t eat something the first, third, or seventh time, the eighth time might be the charm.

I have to constantly remind my son that his taste buds change all the time, and sometimes he’ll try something that he “doesn’t” like and find that it is actually tasty to him now. Consistency has worn down his stubbornness.

One last thing… always have fun! Make it an activity. Get them involved in helping. Chose fun colors, or make it a “theme” night. My son gets to pick out what we are eating one night a week, and he has to accept that the other nights are mommy’s choice. By eating what I chose, he gets the privilege of having whatever he wants every once and a while. A win/win.

Enjoy!

Melted Crayon Art

Have you seen the melted crayon art that has become so popular this year? I’ve noticed and became envious of all of the beautiful canvas art that was being produced. I had to do it.

You need:

A hot glue gun

A whole bunch of crayons

A hair dryer (or heat gun)

Canvas (I used poster board… cause I’m cheap)

Although this activity was not the most kid-friendly activity, I still had the help of my little mischief maker. He got to pick out all of the colors and match them up according to shade. I hot glued them to the poster board, set it up on some plastic underneath, and got to blow drying. He helped me a little bit… by “helped” I mean he kept interrupting and asking questions… which would have been fine, except for the loud blow dryer.

This project took forever it seemed… probably over an hour of constant heat application from the blow dryer. It was messy and although I used plastic around the piece, there was still a splatter that got on the wall…

I love it!

But I’m never doing that again!

“Jacob’s Dad Caught Him a Snake…”

Boys, boys, boys. How gross they can be.

“I want daddy to catch me a snake.”

“No.”

“Jacob’s dad caught him a snake. Daddy can catch me one.”

“No.”

“But, Jacob…”

“No.”

“Aww, can you ask daddy to catch me one? Pppllleeeaaassseee?”

“Your daddy would be more likely to kill it than pick it up so you can pet it.”

“Awwwwww….”

Cue the whining….

Image credited to MorgueFiles.com

Let’s just say, we live on the edge of some woods on one side… and a corn field on the other. Snakes are abundant. But, seriously, I’m not going to have one as a pet. My silly little boy.

Then, he caught a frog. I can deal with that. Except he wanted to keep it. As much as frogs are not my friends, I did not want to make it suffer. It would’ve been dead within a day, knowing how my son is with taking care of things.

Cue the whining…

The time daddy brought home a lizard he found near work and we had to let it go…

Cue the whining…

How about a new stuffed animal? I’d be cool with that. Even one of those cool HexBugs (robot bugs that shoot across the floor). I’d totally buy one of those. In fact, I did, thinking that I was brilliant. I was totally the coolest mom ever. Right? Nope, wrong. It’s sitting at the bottom of his toybox right now.

*Sigh* boys will be boys. Smelly and weird.

Eyedropper Volcanoes

Science experiments can be loads of fun for children, as well as educational. I’ve been wanting to do a volcano with my son for a while now. He’s 6 and like to see things “explode.” However, I was not exactly ready to put in all the time and effort of making a full-blown volcano model… what can I say–I’m lazy er, I like to be efficient with my time. So I put it on the back burner and didn’t put it into action quite yet. I knew we would do it one day, just not today.

And then, a genius post on Preschool Playbook–eyedropper volcanoes!

Click on photo to go to Preschool Playbook

 

Using a pile of baking soda and a cup of vinegar (dyed with food color), they made volcanoes using eyedroppers. Watch the kid’s amazement as a drop of liquid turns to a bubbling acid when it hits the white powder. Such a great experiment to learn about chemical reactions. And very little set-up involved, which I love!

My child, however amazed he was, got over it in about 5 minutes flat. I think a younger child may have enjoyed it for longer than he did.

And so, the volcano model is still in the back of my mind as the ultimate mind-blowing experiment.

Enjoy!

Don’t Pee in the Water!

When you were a kid, did you pee in the water? In the pool or the bathtub? I know I did *shame*. And I knew my son would too.

And he did.

At bath time, I would tell him, “Use the potty.” And he would say he didn’t have to go. But, as soon as he got in he would shoot a stream up into the air… and I would chastise him. And he would laugh… because boys are gross and like farts.

One night, we were repeating this urination charade. He went out of his way to arch up and make sure I saw the stream of yellow go in the air, laughing hysterically with his mouth open. Suddenly the laughing turned into horrified screaming! I reached down to comfort him and watched as his batted at his tongue with his hand, like he was trying to get a bad taste out of his mouth.

What happened? You guessed it.

He peed into his own mouth.

And then it was my turn to hysterically laugh… I laughed so hard I cried. My sides hurt from the chuckles. I just couldn’t stop heckling… which got me the stink eye from a very upset little boy.

He never peed in the bath tub again.

Ceiling Fan Tornado

Have you ever made a bottled tornado? Kids usually like learning about weather and it can be a great visual experimentation for them. A few weeks ago I saw a spin-off of this idea–a ceiling fan tornado. My heart rate spiked. I had streamers, I had a ceiling fan, and I had a crazy child.

PERFECT COMBINATION!

This was my calling… this is why I became a mother… to make kids squeal with excitement. I bravely stood on a chair, despite my fear of heights, and taped those streamers to that fan. Then I placed one crazy child underneath and turned the fan on medium.

This is what happened:

Cue the squeals of delight as a whirlwind enveloped his little frame.

A complete success. As his joy increased to maximum he decided that he wanted even more. “Turn it up!” So, up to high it went…

Successful and fun experiment.

Enjoy!

Tornado in a Bottle