July, 2011

s’mores, originally uploaded by WesTheYeTi.

Very soon we will be camping. Last year was such a wonderful experience that we hope to do this more and more often. However, as wonderful as it was, the weekend we chose to go had a fire ban in effect. There won’t be a ban this year.

This means marsh mellows! Hot dogs! Smores!

Actually, I don’t anticipate the smores being all that popular. Despite the allure of chocolate, I hate smores. It’s the… messiness of it all.

I know.
I sound a little OCD when I talk about food sometimes, though.

I was amazingly well into my late teens, perhaps even my early twenties before I actually elected to eat a hamburger. Hot dogs just seemed… less messy.

I can’t even really describe to you my feelings around hard shell tacos. Suffice to say, I think they are silliest food item on the face of the earth. They are hard and filled with crumbly bits of burger, shredded lettuce and messy sauce. Once you bite into the hard shell it cracks. OF COURSE IT CRACKS! And everything goes everywhere. As a child, my heart sank whenever I saw them for dinner. I see them in the grocery store now and silently applaud myself for making it to adulthood and never having to endure the torture of hard shelled tacos again.

If there is nothing else left in life, I can be happy that I have the choice to avoid the hard shell taco.
Life is beautiful.

Actually, I was never a fan of the marsh mellow either, really. Too sticky. Too sweet. Too hot.

Hot dogs. That’s where it’s at.
And perhaps bananas in foil. I can handle mess with a spoon. I’m like the opposite of a 2 year old – or Billy Bob Thorton because I hate plastic in my mouth.

Oh Lord, I sound insane.
Someone comment that they are somewhat near my line of thinking here.
Please.

on top of the world – explored!!!, originally uploaded by sma_kee.

On one of the last days of school, Franklin did a science experiment with his class. The classic Egg Drop. Everyone had to design a way for their (raw) egg to safely drop from the roof of the school onto the concrete down below. Interestingly, the letter home explaining this experiment had a bold faced request for parents to NOT help with the construction or the idea.

Funny?
Actually, this was a hard task for me. Not only because I love this kind of stuff but because who wants to see the disappointment on their child’s face when that egg yolk runs all over the cement?

It’s not only the “bad people” and the earthquakes and the looming deadly viruses that I try to protect my children from, it is also emotional trauma.

Hrmf. Apparently, a failed egg experiment would be considered emotional trauma… I live in a very privileged part of the world and have a very lucky life. What can I say? I’m spoiled. Ergo, my children are spoiled.

However, I’ve seen what happens when parents get too involved in their child’s school work. Not only do they not learn what they are supposed to be learning but they receive a message of “You can’t do this on your own.”

Easy to say until you show up to a Math competition and see the submissions from other “kids” that are far more advanced then they would do on their own and who wins the competition? The kids who have the parents so involved that they couldn’t explain the thing without constantly referring to Mom and Dad in the background.

Like pageant parents, really.
SMILE, DAMMIT!!

Blech.
What message does THAT send?

ANYWAY….
I didn’t help with this project. Don’t get me wrong, I WANTED to help. I wanted to help very badly. Luckily, Franklin was all over that urge as he specifically told me to back off before I even opened my mouth. The child knows his mother.

The result?
He was brilliant.

Not only did he experiment with different parachute sizes to makes sure he got the best one, but he checked off all the rules to the entry and followed it to a tee (which could not be said for many of the other kids but I’m not competitive or anything… ahem).

Also, the egg floated gently to the ground. It wasn’t a hard thud and a tense moment when he checked the contents but a most definite, “Why bother looking? That was awesome” kind of landing.

The kicker?
Part of the exercise was to crack the egg after the landing was successful to prove the it wasn’t hard boiled. My son took out his egg and….

Cracked that baby into the bowl WITH ONE HAND like he was bloody Jamie Oliver!

I couldn’t have been prouder.