The Flintstone Dilemma

A big change happened in our family, not too long ago. My little girl went from getting the vitamin drops I’ve given her since she was an infant to getting a daily, big girl, chewable vitamin!

Standing in Costco (alone, of course, which allowed the following-), I perused the children’s vitamins and weighed the various pros and cons of each. Sugar content? Gummy versus chewable? Mommy-guilt levels (because as all good mommies know, mommy-guilt is the secret ingredient hidden in just about everything)...

Mommie Guilt:  It's not overt - but it's there.  For instance, see where it says for children 2 & 3 years of age to "chew one-half tablet daily"?  Yep, you guessed it - she's been getting 'em whole.

...By the way, we're really expected to guillotine these things?  Really?

Finally the choice was made: Flintstone’s Vitamins!

I made my purchase and left, feeling very excited to be taking this next step of the Big Girl Journey with my little girl.

Aw, hi there, Fwed and Bawney.

I couldn’t then foresee several problems. The first being, my 3-year-old doesn’t have a clue who the Flintstones are. I think this is an issue with most contemporary toddlers, unless their parents hunt through random cable channels that run ancient cartoons at odd hours and can then DVR said cartoons. Or possibly the parents find them on YouTube and commence education thataway.

But not having that foresight here in our home, I’ve managed thus far to circumvent the issue by, every morning, telling her the name of the lucky character who tumbles out of the vitamin jar and into her chubby, outstretched hand.

Which brings us to the second problem. When something’s so cute and has a fun name, “Barney Rubble,” “Dino,” “Pebbles” or “Bam Bam” – how can the kid be expected to NOT play with it? Once named, our Flintstone vitamins began taking all sorts of side adventures on the way to their proper destination. Only this morning I had to assure Siennalee that her little purple guy - this time it was the alien… was there an alien on the Flintstones? - that he definitely would not do well venturing down into the bread machine as it hummed and bumped along with dough.

See?  Aliens.

And the third and last dilemma, which is perhaps the most disturbing: Am I the only parent who finds it disconcerting to announce a cutesie name and character to a wide-eyed toddler holding the wee stamped vitamin and then follow it up with, “Now eat him”?

I really should’ve gone with the gummies.

A Nice Day for a Walk. And a Lesson or Two.

The weather's been gorgeous today! Siennalee and I took full advantage of it and went down to the park, played for quite a while, and then walked to the mailboxes.

This was the first time we've walked so much without me putting her in a stroller, so it was pretty neat. She's still learning her walking "boundaries" - staying on the sidewalk, not running too far ahead of mommie, etc.

On the way back she started to play a game where she won't come with me (and runs away when I go to grab her hand), so a couple houses away from home, I stopped chasing her and just kept walking.

Slowly, resolutely, I marched on, knowing that at some point she has to understand that she needs to make the choice to follow the wiser person who knows the way, or she could find herself lost, alone and unprotected.

She stood there, rooted to the ground, and stared open-mouthed as I got farther and farther away. Once she started following slowly, I turned around to walk with her, and she turned and ran back the opposite direction. I wheeled around and resumed walking home. She followed.

Heart beating madly, mind calculating how far and fast I'd have to run to snatch her up if danger came racing up the road, I went into the house and peeked my head out the door. She'd followed me and now stood at end of the driveway, looking at the house but not seeing me peeking out the door.

I saw her little mouth mutely form the word "Mah-meee" and ZOOM! I flew out to get her! She wrapped her little arms around my neck and asked, "What you doin' Mommie?"

Consequences are hard to learn; this I've known for years. What is slowly being revealed to me now, is how hard they are to teach.