Waffles...Liam's latest thing is waffles. While he likes eating them, he seems even more eamored of making them. Particularly the fact that they come out of the waffle maker. It is not uncommon to find our waffle iron out in the living room in the play kitchen stuffed with plastic beads, wooden toast, or whatever else he fancies "making waffles" out of.
It is also not uncommon that the waffle maker and the game of making waffles is the silver bullet to quell an otherwise tragic moment of toddler emotional upheaval. Typically it goes something like this:
parent: do you want to play trucks?
liam: no
parent: do you want to play with trains?
liam: no
parent: do you want to read a book or do a puzzle?
liam: NO!!!
parent: do you want to play making waffles?
liam: (crying immediately ceases and now smiling) yeah
The other day this went to another level. Kelly and Raelin went off to pick up our weekly share of the winter CSA, though Liam was to stay home with me. Of course this sent him into unhappy fits. I wasn't yet done with my work day, so Liam joined me in the office and as the ladies went out the door I started asking Liam if he wanted to watch videos of trucks, trains, or tractors. All of which were answered with a sobbing "no". Then the idea struck..."I bet YouTube has waffle videos." "Liam, you want to to watch waffle videos?." He did. So we watched the ad for the Cucino Pro Waffle Maker. Over. And over. And over. At some point I couldn't stand that one anymore and we moved onto various other waffle maker videos. We were still watching waffle maker videos when Kelly and Raelin returned...
Chuckers...the other day I was bringing Raelin home from ballet. As we drove past the golf course (sans golfers of course), she asked the inquisitive question "do golfers where helmets?" Having learned that it's often more fun and entertaining to hear the line of logic of a 3 and now 4 year old I innocently asked "why would a golfer need to wear a helmet?" to which she answered in the self-assured way only a 4 year old can: "to protect their heads from the balls they throw with their chuckers." I laughed. And laughed some more. And she laughed to as I explained that even though golf clubs look a lot like the Chuckit we used to throw balls for the dogs with, they actually hit the balls, and that they are also very careful about where they hit them.
On another trip home from town as we zoomed along our local regional highway (highway being a stretch for those of you in more populated areas) only to have traffic come to a sudden halt. 3 big llamas were on the road, looking more than a little bewildered as to how they got there and where they were supposed to be. I pulled over and called 911, mostly so I could report to the dispatch when they asked "what's your emergency?" "there are 3 llamas wandering around in the middle of highway 17." The dispatch took it all in stride, asking such pertinent questions as "have any of them been hit" and such.
