Sunday, October 5, 2008

Goldilocks & the Three Kids


When we were planning our family, I could have never, ever predicted how different each of our children would be. In my mind, they were all coming from the same parents- they would all be fairly similar... HA!

A lot of times I can guess how a child will react to a situation by looking at "Birth Order." For example, Keith has characteristics of both an "only child" and a "first child." Emma has characteristics of both a "first child" and a "second child." Amy is pretty squarely a "youngest child."

But, they still have their own personalities and their own ways of dealing with things. For example, Amy, the youngest, will scale the cabinets to retrieve her own dishes, then she will pull things out of the refrigerator and even heat it herself in the microwave.

However, Keith will stand in front of the refrigerator and call to me upstairs, "Mom, can you get me some milk?"

"Honey, can you get it yourself?" I call back down.

"No, I can't," he whines.

"Amy, can you help him?" I call back down, sarcastically.

"Sure!" she calls back, excited.

"Mooom! Make her stop it!" Keith screams.

"I got it!" Emma calls.

Finally, I drop what I'm doing and head downstairs.

"Okay, what's going on?" I sigh.

"Amy is trying to get my milk for me and I don't want her to," Keith whines.

"I was just trying to help," Amy whines back.

"I told him I would help," Emma sighs, "but he said he wanted you to help him."

At this point, I wonder if there's a hidden camera somewhere, and if this is all some elaborate trick to make me crazy. Sadly, it's not.

I sigh again, to which all the kids look at me questioningly.

"What's wrong, mom?" Keith asks.

Do I really have to explain? *Sigh*

I knew parenting would have it's ups and downs, but I never realized I would question my sanity on such a regular basis...
I do hope that Keith will begin to learn to be a little bit more independent. I hope that Emma stays as completely sweet as she is. And I hope that Amy... well, I hope that Amy continues to be Amy...

But regardless of how they may "turn out" or what their "birth order personality" may be, my kids are "just right" the way they are...
How could a parent ask for more than that?...
Well- MAYBE it would be just a little nice if Keith could get his own milk now and then...

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