Mom, The Word ‘Please’ is not Magic

August 5, 2010 by · 1 Comment
Filed under: Around DC, Kindergartners 

My Son: “Mom, the word, ‘Please’ is not a magic word.”

ME: “People say it’s magic because if you ask someone nicely to do something,

they’ll usually do it.”

My Son: “But it’s not magic.”

ME: “Where did you learn that?”

My Son: “We all decided it… at camp.”

Ya never know what they are going to learn at camp…


I’m Sure Glad My Son is Riding Without Training Wheels Now- Because I’m Riding A Bike Now Too!

The Schwinn 'June' Coaster Bike

I have not ridden a bike since childhood.

There- I said it.

I’ve never been ‘big’ into bikes (don’t throw stones, you mountain-bike-weekend-trip-enthusiasts!!).

But it’s funny how life can change in an instant, with a whimsical choice…

Our family went down to Bethany Beach a few weeks ago, while at the very same time- my son had just taken his training wheels off his bike.  I remembered that there was a bike rental shop right in the heart of Bethany and asked my son if he’d like to rent a 2-wheeler for the week, He LOVED the idea and in the next moment I decided that I would rent a bike, then my husband decided he would rent a bike too…

So we spent our Beach Week riding bikes as a family-

~A place I couldn’t imagine getting to in our lives back when I was cleaning up snot or vomit or changing diapers.  We were ‘that family’, riding along, with the ocean breeze at our backs, that you glance at and think, ‘Isn’t that nice?!’

I enjoyed it so much that I thought about getting a bike at home.  So then we packed up everything and drove back to ‘reality’ and left the beach behind.  I arrived home to find a week’s worth of mail in our entry way, even though I had  ‘stopped’ the mail… ‘Great’, I thought, as my son trounced through the catalogues and bills mangling up in a even bigger mess.  I reached down to gather a first pile up and on the top of the pile was a flier from Performance Bicycles (where we got my son’s bike) announcing they were having a huge sale- that weekend… (karma ?!).

The next day we all went to the bike store and I bought the Schwinn ‘June’ Coaster Bike (with automatic shifting!) and I love it…

and I LOVE that my son and I are riding our bikes together.

You’ve come a long way, baby!


The CRAZINESS of 6-Year-Olds… How Does That Seem Logical to You?!

June 2, 2010 by · Leave a Comment
Filed under: Food and Drink, Kindergartners 

Ahhh, it’s usually very nice, I imagine, to be 6… playgrounds, milk and cookies, the tooth fairy- all good stuff.
But sometimes, it just makes no sense!
Case in point:
My son LOVES:
* Ketchup
* Pizza sauce
* Spaghetti
* Cheese
BUT refuses to eat Spaghetti Sauce ON Spaghetti because he says he doesn’t like it…
I’ve explained to him that spaghetti sauce is very much like pizza sauce…
AND THAT IT’S ALL BASICALLY TOMATO SAUCE… LIKE KETCHUP…
which he eats with EVERYTHING… and basically couldn’t live without,

And he looks at me like I’m lying to him, or something,
like Spaghetti Sauce has some hidden booby trap and it is laced with HOT PEPPERS,
or something.
And I’ve told him, ‘Why would I lie to you? I’m your Mom. Trust me.’ I mean- I’ve taken care of him every day for 6 years now and loved him… so why would I lie to him about Spaghetti Sauce??!!

Oh, and now, this morning, he just informed me that he doesn’t like the hot dogs at school anymore…
Because of how they taste with chocolate milk   ??!!

What sense does that make?

Does Your Child Have any weird food hang-ups?

What Are THE RULES of the Tooth Fairy?

May 25, 2010 by · Leave a Comment
Filed under: Kindergartners, Parenting 

I just learned something of vital importance in the real world of little boys and little girls…

The Tooth Fairy.

Yes, the tooth fairy is up there with Santa… at least in our house.

My son recently lost his first tooth- and he’s OVER THE MOON ABOUT IT!

There is even a ‘tooth chart’ in his classroom.  You get on the chart when,

you guessed it, you lose a tooth.

But what are the rules of the tooth fairy?  Lots of kids we know have gotten presents from the tooth fairy; a quarter doesn’t cut it anymore.

So when the tooth fairy visited our house, he or she left 6 dollars (because my son is 6) and a whiffle ball and bat.  The tooth fairy also wanted me to tell my son that the 6 dollars was a one-time-thing, for his FIRST tooth.  He/She will be leaving a dollar from now on.

A fellow mom friend explained to my son and hers why different kids get different things from the tooth fairy:

“I think there are lots of tooth fairies and there are boy tooth fairies too.  I think there is at least a few per zip code.  I mean, there are lots of kids out there.”

And my son nodded in agreement like, ‘of course, that’s why kids get different presents from the tooth fairy… because they are different fairies, and some like to give dollars and some give whiffle bats and balls and some wrap their presents and some do not!’

And so, in my son’s mind, there are lots of fairies all around, watching for ‘falling teeth’ and ready to work, when we go to bed.

That’s not a bad place to be.

Why Bingo Rocks!

Yeah, Bingo Rocks!

Why does Bingo rock?  Well, after just attending my first Bingo Night at my Kindergartner’s school I’ll tell you why-

  • Bingo is easy
  • Bingo is fun
  • Everyone has an equal chance of winning!
  • It’s inexpensive
  • It involves PRIZES, and who among us, doesn’t love prizes!
  • It also involves snacks
  • It’s a social thing, so nobody is ‘ULTRA ANGRY COMPETITIVE’
  • You can be a little distracted, and still do well (see first point above)
  • A Kindergartner can win (my son won a Cooler and Beach Towel)!
  • and last but not least, it’s a nice family activity

Or maybe, I’m just getting old older…

Do I sound like your Grandmother??


    No Pennies After 2011… Really?

    May 12, 2010 by · Leave a Comment
    Filed under: Economics, Kindergartners 

    It went over the blogosphere over the last month that the US Mint would be stopping production of pennies altogether in April 2011…

    My son’s Kindergarten teacher even told their class that pennies were no longer going to be minted after next year.

    The argument is that it is more expensive to make pennies than pennies are worth.

    I completely believed this.  My son did too.  My husband did too.

    And then we were all informed by my son’s Kindergarten teacher that it had been an April Fool’s Joke… (and she had believed it too).

    I felt really dumb, I must say.

    Getting rid of the penny?  How can we get rid of the penny?  But then I looked into it… and it makes some sense.

    According to Wikipedia–  “As of March 2008, it costs about 1.7 cents to mint a penny. Now that the price of the raw materials exceeds the face value, there is a risk that coins will be illegally melted down for raw materials.”

    AND- “With the average wage in the U.S. being about $17 per hour in 2006, it takes about two seconds to earn one cent. Thus, it is not worthwhile for most people to deal with a penny. If it takes only two seconds extra for each transaction that uses a penny, the cost of time wasted in the U.S. is about $3.65 per person annually, about $1 billion for all America. Using a different calculation economist Robert Whaples estimates a $300 million annual loss.”

    PLUS- “Pennies are not accepted by all vending machines or toll booths, and pennies are generally not accepted in bulk. In addition, people often do not use cents to pay at all; they may simply use larger denominations and get pennies in return.  Pennies end up sitting in jars and are not in circulation. Economist Greg Mankiw says that ‘The purpose of the monetary system is to facilitate exchange, but… the penny no longer serves that purpose’.”

    AND- Prices would not be higher — “Research by Robert Whaples, an economics professor at Wake Forest University, using data on nearly 200,000 transactions from a multi-state convenience store chain shows that rounding would have virtually no effect. Consumers would gain a tiny amount – about 1/40th of a cent per transaction.”

    PLUS, and us moms know this- “The reduced-cost clad zinc penny, which has been produced since mid-1982, holds additional dangers when swallowed by children and others, unlike all previous U.S. coins. If the copper plating is breached, the penny quickly corrodes into a sharp-edged object, which is more likely to lodge in the digestive tract. Injury is more likely and furthermore, zinc and copper digested from the lodged pennies may be toxic. A five kilogram dog was fatally poisoned by swallowing two pennies.”

    And One More thing- Did you know that in 2002 bills went through Congress to try to eliminate the PENNY?

    A Penny For Your Thoughts?

    Or should I Say,

    A Nickel?


    Have You Been Corrected By a Stranger… about Your Child?

    April 26, 2010 by · Leave a Comment
    Filed under: Kindergartners, Mom Blogs 

    Have you ever been corrected by a stranger… that you are giving your child wrong information?

    Well, it’s now happened to me.

    The setting: McDonald’s for a ‘special breakfast’.  I know, I know, but we don’t go to McDonald’s a lot.

    The situation:

    My son says to me, while eating pancakes,

    “Mom, Albatrogen can fly and sleep at the same time; can any other animals do that?”

    To which I reply,

    “I’ve never heard of an Albatrogen, and I don’t think any animals can sleep and fly at the same time.”

    When an elderly man sitting at the booth next to us cleared his throat and offered, “Umm.  He’s right.  I think he was trying to say, ‘albatross’, and they CAN fly while they are sleeping.”

    “Yeah, Mom- albatrosses!”

    And then my son informed me that they learned the other day in KINDERGARTEN that albatrosses can fly and sleep at the same time…

    and I did not know this animal fact.

    I now have learned, upon further research regarding albatrosses, that a more accurate term might be ‘soaring’ rather than flying.  They can sleep while they soar, locking their wings and relying on the wind to soar or glide.

    But I didn’t know that before; I think I was learning that I shouldn’t pick my nose in Kindergarten, and that sharing is a good thing.  Ah, how times change.

    The elderly gentleman was nice about correcting me.  And I’m glad he did.  I’ve learned something and my son has too.  And he didn’t have a tone like, ‘You idiot, your 6-year-old knows more than you do,’ which is always nice  :)

    I don’t know if I would have done the same thing, however.  I’m on the fence about it.  I think I’m  leaning toward the whole, ‘Mommies go through a lot and are learning as they go every day, and I’m sure she’ll eventually figure out what he meant and then they’ll go look it up and figure out that albatrosses DO fly, or rather, soar, while sleeping…’

    Would You?

    Have You Ever Seen A Snowman Tomato? I Have

    “Mom! We gotta get a picture of this!”

    It’s a tomato… but it’s way more than that,

    according to my son, it’s a ‘snowman tomato’.

    It’s 2 tomatoes grown together… I think…

    Very Cool!  The coolness of this tomato did not stop my son from

    immediately eating it after this picture was taken, however…

    Sorry Mr. Tomato, a 6-year-old’s loyalty is brief and fleeting


    Team WhyMommy Virtual Science Fair- Our Experiment was Cool… and Messy

    April 7, 2010 by · 5 Comments
    Filed under: Around DC, dc metro moms, Kindergartners, Mom Blogs 

    Team WhyMommy Today I am joining a lot of Mommy Bloggers out there to support Susan, aka WhyMommy;

    She is a great mom, cool blogger… AN ASTROPHYSICIST (How cool is that?!) and a cancer fighter and survivor.

    Today she is undergoing surgery… again.

    To Honor Susan and her love and attention to Science, we did a Science Experiment!

    Now, I am NOT an astrophysicist, and neither is my son, although who knows, he may be some day-

    so we took a page from an experiment we saw on WETA KIDS.  And that’s a lesson in itself- you don’t have to make-up your own science experiment, if your child is excited to try an experiment they’ve seen… go do it!

    My son wanted to make canals of water, change their direction and flow, and see how gravity affects the water canals.

    We started out by digging the canals with a couple of different ways the water could go-

    canal 1

    Then we blocked one of the canals-
    canal 2

    But we soon found out that water can go around a blockage, so we did it again,
    canal 3

    This Time, we were successful!
    canal 4

    And we watched our ball continue down the canal that we wanted!

    But that wasn’t it for us- we decided, since we had dug up part of a flower bed in our back yard,
    and already ‘watered’ it-

    that we would plant flower seeds all over !!!!!
    canal 5 flowers

    Because We Are ALL ABOUT New Life, Living, and Planting Seeds of Hope
    Here at BananaBlueberry!

    And That’s How We Roll!

    These Flowers Seeds are FOR YOU SUSAN!

    MUCH LOVE AND MANY PRAYERS TO YOU TODAY SUSAN, AND EVERY DAY!

    Astrophysicists Rock  :)


    Art Project: Make Steering Wheels From Paper Plates!

    March 31, 2010 by · 1 Comment
    Filed under: Kindergartners, Toys 

    steering wheels Got a car-obsessed, truck-loving kid?

    I do.

    There are cars and trucks ALL OVER my house…

    and steering wheels.

    ‘Steering wheels?’ You may ask…

    Why yes, steering wheels.

    They are really paper plates, but the minute they are cut and decorated with symbols, they become…

    steering wheels.

    My son LOVES them and HIS FRIENDS do too.

    We have All car brands represented, and he likes to pick a favorite-of-the-day to take along with him in the car.  He ‘drives’ in the back seat, we keep extra steering wheels in the car for friends and THEY drive in the back seat too, in our car.

    Ahhh, imagination :)

    How do you make a steering wheel?  Well, we’ve done research here in our house (trust me), and we’ve found the best site to find ALL DIFFERENT BRANDS of cars and thus, pictures of steering wheels, is CarMax.  Click on whatever ‘kind’ of car steering wheel you want (Toyota, Chevy,etc.), click on a specific car, and there will be pictures of it,

    Click on ‘More Photos’ under each car and there is always a close up of the steering wheel.

    Isn’t that cool?

    So now you know,

    and you’re the Cool Mom :)

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