Everyday, while raising a toddler, I feel like I am on “Let’s Make A Deal” and I'm in the last round giving it my best shot trying not to mess up, because frankly, if I don’t win now against a 2 year old, I may just come to terms with the fact that I will never win, ever again.
For instance, the other day we were on a play-date at McDonald’s. The mother’s enjoyed a hearty McDouble while the tots played in the play place while munching on French fries they discovered on their mission to the slide (but honestly, the kids were too far away to stop them from eating someone else's leftover fries and it's situations like this that build my child's immune system (yeah, I totally think this now but I would never tell this to Chase's doctor).
This particular McDonald's has a basketball hoop and a climbing gym (To a two year old, this is quite the score.). These two activities are great, individually, but there is no telling how much havoc can be reeked if these two activities are combined. So, naturally, my child wanted to play both activities at the same time.
He grabbed a ball from the basketball area, as sneakily as he could (well I don't think a 2 year old who is constantly chatting up a storm- to himself or anyone within hear shot of him- can be that sneaky, but he gave it a fair shot). I heard him from a distance discussing his plan with himself. His conversation went a little something like this, "Yeah, I'll bring the ball up the stairs and throw it. It's a mighty great plan." After hearing his "mighty great plan" I knew I had to intervene.
So I walked over to him (after I put down my McDouble, wiped the ketchup from my face, took a quick slurp of soda and grabbed three fries for the way), knelt down on my knees and asked him what he was doing. He was honest and told me his mighty great plan. I told him that I didn't think it was a good plan because kids could get hurt (which is my typical go-to phrase when I don't approve of an activity) and as I said this, the corner of his lips started to quiver. I knew at this second my child was going to be unhappy and since I hate when he is unhappy (and a tantrum would probably lead to us having to leave McDonald's and I still wanted to finish my fries and get at least 2 more soda refills-Who doesn't feel like they should drink their weight in fountain pop when they go out to eat?), I totally made a deal with him. I told him that he could bring the ball up the play gym as long as he didn't throw it at anyone’s face.
Fair? I think so. (Although, I probably should have added that he couldn't throw the ball at anyone's body parts as part of my deal- oops my bad!)
Mommy: 1 Chase: 0
No wait, I think Chase actually may have come out ahead on this round, but I can't quite tell- so we'll call this one a tie.
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