Tag Archives: Chase McFadden

Icing the Snowballs

21 Feb
snowball

“Eat snow, Shredder!”

Tax Credit #4 and I spent the afternoon playing in the snow yesterday.

We’ve received a fair amount of white stuff over the last couple weeks, which is awesome. It provides opportunities for the types of memorable, enriching activities I want our children to experience.

Like redneck sledding.

And snowball fights.

For me, it’s hard to imagine a childhood void of the thrill of scooping up a handful of fresh, wet snow, packing it as tightly as you possibly can, and drilling a fellow human being directly in the face from a painfully-close range.

However, with a little guy like Tax Credit #4, snowballs and snowball fights have a little different feel to them.

Here are some helpful guidelines for snowballs and toddlers.

1. You’ll need to make all the snowballs for the child because mittened toddler hands are as useless at tits on a crow.

I don’t really understand what that means, but Kick Ass Wife’s grandmother says it all the time and she’s awesome. So I love it.

Anyway, each time #4 attempted to fashion a snowball with his club-like mitts, he became increasingly agitated.

“THIS SNOW’S BROKED!” he finally yelled.

So I corrected his grammar and piled up a pyramid of power-packed projectiles he could use for his personal arsenal.

Which he decided to snack on.

2. Beyond making snowballs, your only other contribution is being a target.

I know it seems snowball “fight” would suggest two opposing sides with the expectation that both are trying to hit the other, but that’s not how it works.

WARNING: DON’T EVEN THINK ABOUT HITTING THE TODDLER WITH A SNOWBALL.

No matter how light and playfully I toss snow at Tax Credit #4, he acts as though he’s been struck down with a bowling-ball sized ice bomb anytime snow so much as grazes him.

TC#4: “DAD! WHY’D YOU DO THAT!”

ME: “Because we’re having a snowball fight?”

TC#4: **TANTRUM**

Snowballs: It's what's for snack.

Snowballs: It’s what’s for snack.

And if even a single crystal of snow accidentally comes in contact with an exposed surface — say his neckline just above the collar of the coat — it’s meltdown city, baby. Game over.

No, if you know what’s good for you, this melee will involve you standing stock-still while the toddler pelts you — ironically – with the snowballs you made.

And remember, a toddler is about waist-high to the average adult, meaning the most-likely place of impact will be your groin.

TC#4: “Gotcha!”

ME: **COUGH** “You sure did!” **COUGH**

Believe me, even while bundled up in a snow suit to the point of almost zero dexterity, a 3-year-old can throw with a surprising amount of velocity, so don’t pack the snowballs you’re making for your child to throw at you too tightly.

3. Suggest you and the toddler team up to throw snowballs at the groin of a third-party target, like a tree.

After several direct shots below the belt, I decided it was time to come up with some type of game that didn’t involve so much abuse.

“Hey, I’ve got an idea,” I said, spitting up blood, “Let’s pretend that tree is Shredder and we’re Ninja Turtles!”

“Oh, yeah!” Tax Credit #4 is all about the Turtles, so luckily for me he was all-in.

At this point, he’d exhausted his first cache of snowballs — all of them having been either eaten or hurled at my crotch — so I sat down to make more ammo.

And ice down my snowballs.

I tell ya, if toddlers would just hit you in the face like they’re supposed to, snowball fights would be a lot funner.

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P Motion Gets His Gei(co)

4 Jan

Before Christmas, I Facebooked thusly:

Well, Santa didn’t leave either of those items under the tree for P Motion. Instead he left a pogo stick, along with a gift card redeemable at our local emergency room.

However, P Motion did get a lizard for his 6th birthday from his mom and dad.

IDIOT! Don’t you remember your own horrific tales of Hopper the Bastard Rabbit*?

Of course I remember. But if there’s one thing I’ve learned as a parent, it’s that I’m not obligated to learn anything from my mistakes. In fact, it’s probably better if I don’t.

Plus the kid really wanted a lizard.

So KAW did the research, and last Friday a terrarium, 50 live crickets, and a hypo high yellow designer leopard gecko arrived at our house via UPS. And, yes, our car insurance went down 15% within 15 minutes of its arrival.

But P Motion’s birthday wasn’t until Monday.

For three days, the gecko now known as Ecko (really) lived in our bedroom closet. And, amazingly enough, we actually managed to keep all of the kids out.

However, we didn’t manage to keep all of the crickets in (feel free to insert a witty bit of entomological humor concerning insects coming out of a closet here). In fact, a cricket just went hopping across the kitchen floor as I write this. Swear.

But finally, Monday we gathered the crew, blindfolded our New Year’s Boy, told him to put his hands out, and sat his present on his hand.

Then we removed the blindfold.

Then we observed a reaction that is very non-typical P Motion (still and silent).

Then he let out a little squeak of disbelief.

Then he and Ecko were bum-rushed by his siblings, who were anything but still and silent. See for yourself.

A few observations:

1. Hellcat is three-quarters howler monkey as judged by the un-Godly decibel level used when speaking to (shouting at) others who are less than a half-foot away; the way that she bounces around on a near-continual basis; and her very hairy arms (and back).

2. Our furniture, which we’ve had for just about six months, isn’t likely to last another six months at the frenetic pace with which or children tromp all over it.

3. KAW is very quick to say that no, geckos don’t ever bite you.

4. Slim got those pajamas for Christmas. We refer to them as the Pink Bunny Pajamas from Aunt Clara.

5. Geckos feel like lizards.

6. Reptiles generally make for happy kids.

7. Ecko has to be thinking, “Son of a — why don’t little old ladies get geckos as pets?”

A week in, both boy and lizard are doing fine. Ecko has even shed his skin once, which seems very symbolic for the new year.

But then we think he ate it, which isn’t quite as symbolic.

*****

*Hopper Update: This past summer, I convinced P Motion that we should release Hopper from his hutch and let him run wild and unrestrained as all bastard animals that crap a lot should. I fully hoped expected that he’d be eaten by the neighbor’s dog or some other type of carnivore within a week.

He wasn’t. I’m happy to report that Hopper is still roaming the range, crapping frequently and freely.

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Cheap Christmas Gifts Kids Will Actually Play With: Air

24 Dec

Oh, man, pleeeasse let this be air.

It’s Christmas Eve and you’re still looking for that last perfect present for your younglings.

You’ve already arranged for a festive Christmas morning gravel dumping, and a handful of defunct electronic devices that your children sabotaged in the past year lay wrapped neatly beneath the tree, but you feel like there’s something missing. Something that will provide your children with that sense of wonderment and endless possibility that only the perfect gift can deliver.

And then you realize what it is, right there under your nose.

Well, actually, in your nose. And everywhere else.

The most inexpensive– and simplest — of the Cheap Christmas Gifts Kids Will Actually Play With is air, and it involves nothing more than closing an empty cardboard box, wrapping it, then waiting for the magic to ensue.

Oh, man, please let that not be breakable.

All parents have experienced that sense of bewilderment as they watch their kid cast aside that highly-sought-after (and often highly-expensive) toy on Christmas morning — the one thats acquisition involved bum-rushing the doors of Target at an ungodly hour and taking a fingernail file shiving to the kidney-region from an incensed, bargain-crazed grandmother and a liberal pepper-spraying from an over-zealous police officer outfitted in the season’s most stylish riot gear — to play with the three-cent box that kidney-costing toy came packaged in.

So why bother with the toy? The air that fills the empty space in that box will be just as gratifying to a young child.

However, if you really want to give the gift of nothingness, fill that empty box with packets of individually encased air in the form of bubble wrap, and you are going to provide off-the-charts joy. Just make sure that you have enough poppable packaging packets for each child in the family, because if you don’t, the fight they’ll have over who gets to squish them will make that Target toy aisle shopper scrum look like a friendly between opposing squads in the Mr. Rogers Soccer League for Passive and Abnormally Well-Mannered Children.

Total disappointment. That box actually did contain a shopping cart.

Oh, and if you’re wondering where you can get a really terrific box the day before Christmas, I hear that Target is having quite a sale on 72-inch flatscreen televisions.

Just don’t forget your body armor and safetly goggles.

*****

Merry Christmas, everyone! Here’s wishing you and yours extra-gravelly gravel, the finest in non-functioning electronic crap, and especially airy air wrapped in the sturdiest of cardboard boxes.

The Species Crew

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Cheap Christmas Gifts Kids Will Actually Play With: Electronic Crap They Probably Broke in the First Place

7 Dec

Our family’s tub-o-crap. Lot of fun in there.

All children are unique– be it their personality characteristics, physical qualities, or individual abilities to successfully pass small objects they’ve swallowed — but one attribute common to all kids is their innate knack for breaking stuff, particularly electronic devices.

Every parent’s been there: you have a fully-functional DVD player one minute, and the next minute — that minute right after a child loads a Lego into the front of it with the same delicate care Ndamukong Suh applies when removing a quarterback’s head  – the thing starts buzzing and whirring like R2-D2 hopped up on Red Bull.

So what to do with that now defunct $40 DVD player? Put it back in the original box you still have in the top of the linen closet for God-knows-what-reason, wrap it up, and put it under the tree. Boom! Like gravel, crap electronics is another of the Cheap Christmas Gift Kids Will Actually Play With.

How does this work? It works because if there is one thing kids like more than unintentionally breaking electronic devices, it is being given free-reign to purposefully and systematically demolish them. That one junk item you have? Suddenly it becomes a 1000 much smaller junk items that will entertain your kids for hours (okay, the “1000 much smaller junk items” piece of that sentence doesn’t seem too appealing, so just focus on the “entertain your kids for hours” part).

Slim took an art class at our YMCA which was based on this very principle. Kids were set loose with screwdrivers, pliers, and hammers and given the go-ahead to take apart an assortment of broken electronic devices. Then they created art from bits and pieces of what they’d been allowed to break apart into bits and pieces.

Hellcat, Slim, and friends getting their destruction/creation on.

This is all Slim talked about for days.He and his best buddy — and fellow Star Wars aficionado – worked on building a Clone Wars battleship in this class for weeks, which we were “lucky” enough to bring home once the class ended (admittedly, it seems unfair that his friend’s family didn’t get the pleasure of enjoying this creation in their own home, but don’t worry: at some point it will show up on their doorstep be shared with them, as well).

We have no shortage of broken electronic crap around — said DVD player, CD players, multiple laptops (remove the batteries) — so after seeing and hearing how geeked up Slim was about this activity, we let our crew loose.

MAGIC.

The simple act of removing a screw fascinated them. They clipped and pulled wires. When all else failed — and sometimes before all else failed — they resorted to the hammer.

The robot P-Motion recently created.

Exploration. Breakage without scolding. Rebuilding into new visions.

Seriously cool stuff. Creative, cheap (that crap had a monetary value at one time but now it’s just laying around), and fun. After all, who doesn’t like to break stuff?

So look around. You’ve gotta have some junk in a trunk somewhere. Find it and give it your kids. They’ll love it.

And just think: when you bought your new electronic stuff for Christmas this year, you were getting the kids’ gifts for next year at the same time.

Win-win, baby.

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Biology 101: Babies Get Pooped Out

1 Dec

I’m still not sure how, but as I drove Slim and Perpetual Motion to school this morning, the conversation from the backseat suddenly veered to babies.

P-MOTION: Dad, do they sometimes have to cut the mom and take the baby out?

ME: Yes.

P-MOTION: Why?

ME: Sometimes there are complications with the baby or the mom and they have to get the baby out right away.

P-MOTION: But they don’t have to cut all moms to get the baby out?

ME: No.

P-MOTION: So it probably doesn’t hurt when moms have babies but don’t have to get cut.

Me: No, I think it actually hurts quite a bit.

Especially with a pumpkin head like yours, I thought.

Perpetual Motion shortly after being pooped into this world.

And then there was a lull. I could hear little 5-year-old wheels turning inside that massive pumpkin head. I knew what was coming next.

P MOTION: So how do babies come out of moms if they aren’t cut out?

Oh, sweet Jesus. Still five minutes to the dropoff point. I was just praying for a deer to come sprinting out of a field and slam into the side of the truck to provide a distraction. But it didn’t happen. I was going to have to address this.

ME: Well… hey, which Toy Story movie is your favorite?

And by “address this” I mean change the subject. But it didn’t work.

P-MOTION: Dad, how do the babies get out?

ME: They just come out.

Smooth, right?

Then Slim whispered something and the two ruffians in the back started snickering.

P-MOTION: Dad, do they get pooped out?

Laughter erupted. There was no chance of recovery at this point, so I went with it.

ME: Yeah, they sort of get pooped out.

And then the boys lost it, and a constant barrage of “FTTTTHHHPPTTTT! Oooh, I had a big baby!” followed by uncontrollable giggles marked the rest of our drive to school.

You’re welcome, biology teachers.

*****

Slim will most likely write something about babies getting pooped out in the near future, but for now you can read another of his treasures over at Stuff Kids Write. I found this one when I was wading through his backpack. But be warned: it’s not for the squeamish.

Not that a discussion of babies getting pooped out is really for the squeamish, either.

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Cheap Christmas Gifts Kids Will Actually Play With: Gravel

25 Nov

Even Batman is powerless against the allure of a gravel pile.

Finally, Black Friday!

Hopefully you were sleeping off the aftereffects of a wicked turkey bender and missed it entirely.

Because if you’re like me, going to Wal-Mart at any time on any day is a black occasion — dark, depressing, likely to induce eye-twitching and mass alcohol consumption regardless of the hour – so the prospect of banging carts down the aisles with hundreds of bargain-crazed spenders at midnight racing to claim the last Bieber Me Elmo (voice raises two octaves/ sings, “Baby, baby, baby, no…” repeatedly) isn’t appealing.

And it’s unnecessary.

Kids lose interest in those “hot” holiday toys in less time than it takes them to decide they have to go to the bathroom after you’ve put their snowsuits on.

So this Christmas, get your kids gifts they’ll actually play with, and, as an added bonus, are inexpensive. It’s a win-win, like Jello shots.

Here’s the first of five gifts that have staying-power.

A Pile of Gravel

This one’s so easy you’ll feel like you’re cheating: call a local construction materials supplier, order a load of gravel, have it dumped in front of your house, set a ribbon on top, and prepare to be voted awesome-sauce parent of the neighborhood by a landslide.

This is perfection on so many levels. One, a big-ass dump truck is going to deliver the goods, and kids go bananas for that type of thing. Two, it’s dirt cheap. You can get a literal ton of road base (sand/gravel mix) for like $20. Number three, nobody’s going to steal it, because when adults look at a pile of gravel, they know they’re looking at a pile of work.

Quarter! Holla!

But for whatever reason, when kids lay eyes on a pile of gravel, they see a pile of opportunity. I’ve witnessed our own children sit and sift for the better part of entire days in search of they-know-not-what, but that doesn’t seem to deter them in the least. Maybe it’s because kids still have that innocent, naive optimism where they believe that if they keep digging deeper and deeper, they’ll eventually unearth something magical and meaningful in what otherwise appears to be a massive mound of nothingness.

It’s similar to an adult’s justification for watching any of the Real Housewives franchises.

And if your children do start to lose interest in the pile, you simply plant a few coins near the surface, pick one out and yell, “OMG! A whole quarter!” and the kids’ll start digging again with the gusto of amateur archeologists.

Plus, they’ll have hundreds of thousands of rocks to wash, and we all know how much kids love that.

Next time on Cheap Christmas Gifts Kids Will Actually Play With, we’ll take a look at all of those junk electronics you have sitting around the house.

*****

While we’re on the subject of kids, head over to Stuff Kids Write and check out “Holy Gwockomoly: This Birthday Card is Be. A. Utiful.” The 7-year-old author of this piece is my nephew. He’s a character. You’ll see.

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Why Parents Must Speak of Unspeakable Things

10 Nov

Offerings are typically pretty light around these parts.

Laughs and levity rule the day. Humor is the goal, presented via an apparatus that is immediate to me: family and parenting and kids.

That’s my life. It’s where I’m at, and it’s what I know.

So I share anecdotes highlighting the good, the bad, the ugly (and the oftentimes messy) realities of raising four young children who are – despite my rumblings – the absolute and unquestioned apples of my eye. I love them beyond compare.

But the past few days, when I’ve thought of children, funny has eluded me.

Heavy thoughts weigh on my mind. My stomach pitches and twists and turns itself inside-out again and again, searching in vain for something that won’t be found, can’t be found.

My heart very literally aches.

Undoubtedly, I’m not alone.

*****

News of events involving an alleged monster and children and unfathomable acts emerged from a college town in Pennsylvania this week.

And let’s be clear: there’s only one monster involved here.

A host of other individuals – an eyewitness, his father, a coaching legend, a multitude of other adults in positions of authority – knew of the atrocities committed by this monster, yet turned a blind eye, inexplicably suppressing what would seem to be the natural human instinct to pick up the nearest blunt object and take matters into their own hands, or at the very least immediately contact police.

Any one of these individuals could have ended this monster’s reign of terror a decade ago by simply acting in the manner that any conscionable person would who was armed with knowledge that a child had been harmed.

The fact that none of these individuals did so makes my eyes well with tears of rage.

These individuals are culpable and their actions are criminal, and for that they’ve paid – or will pay – with their finances and their careers and their consciences and perhaps even their freedom.

But there’s still only one monster.

*****

And let’s also be clear: there’s only one group of victims involved here.

A then 28-year-old graduate assistant who witnessed a 10-year-old boy being sodomized in a shower by a grown man and reacted by calling his father and following his advice to immediately leave the premises is in no way a victim.

An 84-year-old patriarch who was rightfully fired because he put a friendship and a football program ahead of the safety and welfare of children and admits that he could’ve done more is in no way a victim.

College students and fans who took to the streets in an asinine, blindly loyal display of support for a football coach who lost his job rather than a group of young boys who lost their innocence and childhoods are in no way victims.

No, there’s only one group of victims here.

Eight boys at last count, and their families.

But there will be more that come forward.

Boys who knew how painful the truth would be for their loved ones so they kept it all for themselves instead.

Boys who had been too ashamed before now to reveal the dark secret they held inside.

Boys who had convinced themselves that the actions of this monster were somehow their fault.

Boys who had lived for years mistakenly believing they were the monsters.

*****

I believe that my strong visceral reaction to this scandal has a lot to do with being a parent, although such a deep-seated emotional response isn’t limited to those who have children of their own.

After all, in addition to being sons, these victims are also brothers, cousins, nephews, grandsons, friends, students, players, and patrons. Everyone knows a child through some type of relationship, so everyone has an image that can be superimposed on a faceless victim as that monster pins small hands against a shower wall and shatters lives.

But for me, it’s my children: my three sons – ages 7, 5, and 2 – and my daughter – age 4.

It’s each of their faces – terrified eyes and pleading voices –running through my head over and over. It’s my fists clenching. It’s me frantically trying to save them, desperate, wondering what I can do.

And yet I know there’s only one thing I can do to help protect my children.

Talk to them.

*****

I have to make sure that each of my children– in language and terms that they can understand – knows there are some things no person can ever do to them or make them do. Not a friend, not an older child, not an adult, not a relative.

These talks must be fairly explicit. They need to know there’s no gray area.

They’re going to have questions. Tough ones. Kids always do.

Some of those questions will be challenging to answer; some I won’t have answers for at all.

And I absolutely have to stress that if, God forbid, something does happen, it’s not their fault. No matter what. And they absolutely must tell someone.

These conversations are awkward and uncomfortable; they’re far from easy.

But they have to happen.

And they must be frequent, although I have to be cautious: I don’t want to make my children distrustful of others, but at the same time they must know what is unacceptable.

I wish these talks weren’t necessary.

I wish the events involving a monster and children and unfathomable acts that emerged from a college town in Pennsylvania this week had never happened.

For the sake of those boys who were victimized and their families.

For the sake of children and families everywhere.

For the sake of my children and my family.

But, unfortunately, those events did happen.

Those events do happen.

So as a parent, I must speak of unspeakable things.

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Kermit Gets the Cold Shoulder

24 Oct

Kick Ass Wife cleaned out our freezer Friday. Not surprisingly, she found a frog frozen in a small plastic container of water.

She came outside and shared her discovery with me.

“So check this out.”

“Looks like a frog.”

“No crap it looks like a frog. It is a frog.”

It kind of looks like it's swimming (but it's not).

“That would explain the appearance then. And it was in the freezer?” I asked with feigned ignorance.

I say feigned ignorance — one of the many varieties of ignorance I specialize in — because I had come across this particular block of frog last summer but put it back in the freezer so I could show it to KAW. Apparently I forgot, and Kermit on Ice got shuffled behind a box of G0-Gurts and a bag of frozen peas.

“Gee, I wonder who would have put a frog in the freezer?” KAW asked.

“Yeah, that’s a real mystery,” I replied with genuine sarcasm – one of the many varieties of sarcasm that I specialize in.

When it comes to small amphibious creatures appearing in blocks of ice next to the Totino’s, there’s one likely suspect, and he happened to scamper by at that exact moment.

“Look what Mom found.”

“My frog!” Perpetual Motion exclaimed.

His voice had that same gleeful tone of wonderment yours or mine might have when shouting ”My keys!” or “My phone!” or “My hair!” after such a valued item had been located and returned to us after a long absence. Factors like plastic container and ice and the place that our family stores the food that we eat were minor details that had no bearing on P. Motion’s reaction whatsoever.

After momentarily breaking his stride, he bolted off again, leaving KAW and I standing in his 5-year-old wake.

“Oh, well. It could be worse, I guess,” said KAW, sighing and shaking her head.

“True,” I said. “By the way, have you looked in the freezer downstairs?”

*****

So we’re not the only people to find a frogsicle in our deep freeze, right? Any memorable discoveries around your place, amphibious or otherwise?

And while we’re on the subject of kitchen appliances, over at Stuff Kids Write you can check out a note that an 8-year-old left for her dad in the refrigerator. SPOILER ALERT: Frogs were not involved, but Jell-o was. Click here to check it out.

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Stuff Kids Write: Fighting and Siblings? No Way!

6 Oct

Featured today at Stuff Kids Write is 6-year-old E.R.’s poem titled “Fighting.” I bet you can’t guess what it’s about. Here’s a hint: her younger sister. Click here to read a piece that everyone with a sibling or multiple children can relate to.

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StuffKidsWrite.com: It’s Chuck Norris’s Fault

30 Sep

A first grader using a Chuck Norris-ism in a school writing assignment? Holy Walker: Texas Ranger! Click over to StuffKidsWrite.com to find out how this young writer referenced the legend. And remember, “Chuck Norris is a man of few words. Chuck Norris is not a man of few roundhouse kicks to the face.”

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