Trey at Bikeathon

Our extremely brainy cousins came to visit us a couple of weeks ago.  What I mean by “brainy” is that I couldn’t even understand what my cousin’s job was.  He tried to explain it to me, but my brain shut down every time he mentioned “liquidity in the market” or “tweaking the code.” We spent the better part of their visit trying to dumb them down, with some success coming from the smallest of us on a camping trip.

Brent’s Beach

During our trip to Brent’s Beach, where we forgot a spatula and had to use this tapered piece of kindling to make the eggs and there was a lot of shooting of guns, I learned one of those things about which I could have lived forever in blissful ignorance. 

Camp Spatula

Traci informed us that Trey told her that he likes to pee into the hose when he’s outside playing and then turn on the hose to watch the “yellow water shoot out” - which is somewhat funny in light of his warped curiosity, tendency towards experimentation, and lack of propriety. 

The horrifying reality of the story is that I have no idea how long Trey has been doing this, but since we moved into the house, I have always told the boys and their friends to “just drink out of the hose” when they’re outside!

Victory

The measurable effect of our influence is the fact that Traci and Perk started asking themselves “What Would Trey Do?” in any given situation.  

The question I have now is for myself: If Traci and Perk were changed by only spending a week amidst the chaos of our children and their lives, how much have I changed in these last 10 years of being their mother?

After all, I am only mildly unnerved by the fact that all three boys (yes, even the 4 year old) walk around with their bb guns, shooting at everything.  In fact, every package of food we brought home from the camping trip now exhibits a bb hole in it somewhere.  (Warning: To avoid breaking teeth, watch for bb the next time you grab a handful of tortilla chips.)

Though I’ll never be as laid back as my husband is about everything, I’ve learned to prioritize things differently and have built defenses up against the rest:

1. have handy, earplugs/headphones to block out the sound of gunshots,
2. locks on bathroom doors,
3. make sure all iPods and iPads are sufficiently charged for emergency babysitting,
4. save money for kids to participate in soccer camp, basketball camp, fine arts camp, underwater basketweaving camp,
5. always remember extra matches for the kids when camping. 
6. lower your standards or have none.