Before having kids I had heard the wisdom that to create teenagers who clean and are helpful you have to start when they’re toddlers. This made sense to me and I went all in. If you’ve ever tried to do a basic task like sweep a floor or fold laundry with a small child you know it takes 3x as long and 5x the effort. It takes an inordinate amount of energy to both teach the skills themselves, as well as creating the attitude that chores/tasks are just things that have to be done with a good attitude. I remember times when they were young enough to take naps and I’d “secretly” do chores while they were asleep so I could avoid having/letting them help. Well, I’m reaping a whole garden of vegetables of my labor. The kid’s school gives out “promise awards” when any adult other than their teacher sees them behaving especially responsibly or kind. They are part of a raffle for toys but the act of receiving an award is a big compliment. Lorelei got one this week for picking up the coats of other children left on the playground and putting them in lost-and-found. Moriarty has been doing his own laundry for about 6 months and, like me, often forgets to move it from the washer to the dryer. Well Pip heard him up at 11 pm the other night and went to check on him. Moriarty had woken up, realized he’d forgotten about the laundry, went downstairs to move it, then went back to bed. OMG OMG OMG. I wouldn’t even do that. That’s not to say they don’t still have challenges. Moriarty spent 30 min this morning being overwhelmed by 5 min of cleaning he had to do. It’s a process.
Moriarty is still way into Minecraft. It’s one of the best videogames for his age IMO since it mostly focuses on design and building instead of murdering people. So we encourage him playing and Pip has spent a lot of work to set up a server his friends can join. He’s working with their parents, doing network troubleshooting, etc. He also just set up a discord server so they can talk over mics while they play. I prefer it to him playing with strangers and he’s still getting a big social boost. Moriarty gets so excited showing me what he’s built.
The last big first this month was going to see a movie in a theater. There’s a very famous anime production house called Studio Ghibli that is working with Regal to show one movie every month all year. We met up with Moriarty’s friend Miranda and all went to see Kiki’s Delivery Service. It’s about a 13 year old which who has to leave home to finish her “witch in training” service in another city. It’s adorable and we had a lot of fun. I was shocked Lorelei made it with minimal questions and rounds on my lap. Because of Covid we just didn’t consider things like a movie for a long time, but this was a great first experience.
Our other huge first was Lorelei losing her first tooth. Not much more to say but boy was everyone excited.
Quotes and Videos
“What’s that stick in his mouth? What is he doing with it? It’s smells so bad” - Lorelei upon seeing someone smoke a cigarette for the first time