The Young and the Restless

Second Child Syndrom

We all say we'll treat our kids the same and although we love them the same, it is hard to really treat them equally. When Kylie was Jayden's age I would do mommy preschool with her where I planned out all sorts of craft projects and activities. I would sit down with her to do worksheets and the alphabet until she recognized and could write all her letters by age three and learned how to read at age four. She was a little sponge, she loved to learn and I loved spending that time with her. I am now stricken with guilt as Jayden is getting ready to start kindergarten and doesn't even recognize all his letters. I try to make myself feel better by saying that he just doesn't have an interest or attention span to sit down and do "mommy preschool", but the truth is I just haven't made the time. This past week I dusted off the old workbooks and sat down with him and it made me both happy and sad to see that he LOVED learning. Happy because I'm glad he actually enjoys learning and sad because it's something I should have been doing all along. It also made me sad because I realized how much I have underestimated him. I thought he only recognized a handful of letters and numbers but he actually can recognize and write most all of them and I had no idea. (I was also totally caught off gaurd a couple of months ago when Jayden wrote the letters b-o-x and said, "mom, this spells box". Thankfully television has been picking up where I've been slacking off.). I guess it's never too late to change and make up for lost time. I really am going to miss Jayden when he goes to Kindergarten, that little guy definately knows how to put a smile on my face. He has his little phrases that I never get tired of hearing. My favorites are: "good news" and "bad news" if something is cool or lame (like when we were hiking, "good news guys, I found a ditch!"; "definately" and "totally" (like when we were at a restraunt and he refused to go in the bathroom with me because "that is defwinately a gowls bafroom and I am totally not going in there!"; "in real life" (like when I tell him to go potty before we leave but apparently he "already went potty in real life"); "sweety" and "gentleman" (like when they're playing mom and dad he always refers to Kylie as his sweety and says things like "here you go fweety" or when he holds the garage door open for me and says "I am your gentelman, mom"). It also cracks me up to play the wii with him. He can totally kick my pigou (Chinese for butt) on all the games, it's rather emberassing. I keep telling myself that I need to stop going easy on him so that he can learn that it's okay to lose and still be a good sport. So I step up my game, but even then he still kicks my trash. He has gotten pretty good at giving consolation, though. If he beats me he'll say things like, "it's okay if you lose, you still have pwetty eyes", or it's okay if you lose, you still look bootiful". Oh my little man, you always know how to melt my heart!