Of Monkeys and Men

Last night after dinner we had "The Talk" with #2. Now that he has turned ten we thought it was time, like we did with his brother. Neither one ended up with the actual "talk" since they didn't seem interested. (#1 actually told us, "I don't want to know!" during his talk.) So we discussed what it means to be a man, and that it took him 10 years to learn to be a kid, so now he has about 10 years to learn to be a man. One disturbing answer he gave, however, was that a man should do things with his kids like help them with their hobbies..."Well he should help his son with hobbies. His daughter will want to sew and stuff like that and a mom should help with that." Ummm, why can't a guy sew? You like to sew, and you're a guy. He just grinned. Anyway, we left the discussion with "ask your dad if you have any questions." He was happy and ran off to enjoy his night without a bedtime. That is the other biggie about 10; the rules change. No more bedtime, you can sit where you like at church (though he said he still wants to sit with me), and you can watch most PG movies. I have noticed some other rules starting to slip with #1, so I guess he is getting older and may need some new guidelines set out for him. The biggest I have noticed is that he eats when he wants, usually not asking for a snack but just getting it himself. I haven't said much since he is still eating dinner. ------------ When we were in WV, and Hubby was sick, I took the boys to stay at my parents for a night and couple of days. I was looking at EeEe, and noticing how threadbare he is now. He is #1's sock monkey that he got when he was one from his grandparents. For some reason he attached himself to the monkey, and they have been inseparable since. I suggested to #1 that maybe EeEe needs to be put in the memory box in January when he turns 12. #2 heard this and started crying. He said he was cryng for 3 reasons: 1. He doesn't want EeEe to be put in a memory box. 2. If EeEe has to go in the box, OooOoo probably will too. (That is his monkey.) and 3. He felt like throwing up. Gee whiz. They grow up in a lot of ways, but they are definitely still little in others. So I assured him that I didn't plan on forcing EeEe to go in a box, and OooOoo was still fine to stay out, too. As we left the next day, we were halfway down my parents lane, when #2 yells, "Wait! I left OooOoo!" It was a false alarm, OooOoo had just fallen under the seat. It reminded me of when we did leave the monkeys one time. They had to be FedEx'd to us.