Lessons learned growing from two to three kids
29 Aug 2018Living bigger in a world designed for a family of four is a lot harder than I expected. I still remember joking with Andrea that we should have eight kids and fill a bus with them. I also remember even earlier thinking we’d live in some penthouse condo one day. Funny how the image of a lifestyle is so often more desirable than the reality of it!
Of course I still wonder if we’ll have more than three kids but for now the reality is that having eight for us is out of the question. Already it can be quite overwhelming having three kids under 6 years old. I suppose we could fit a few more in the car :)
One of the harder things with this many kids is being able to pay due attention to them now that they outnumber us. Everytime the kiddie pool is out I am constantly scanning the backyard to make sure all heads are above water. Our seven-month-old Charlie needs constant attention and there are times when I’m playing with him while the girls are in the pool and I’m moving my head back and forth like when I’m driving a car to check the mirrors.
Sometimes when we’re busy and the kids are feeling like a bother it seems convenient to turn on Super Mario or TVO cartoons. It’s hard to avoid the screen trap. You start with a bunch of rambunctious toddlers and suddenly you have statues staring at a glowing rectangle. Occasional use of this trap is beneficial, but more than say, 6 hours/week, and you end up with new behaviour like kids screaming about who knocked whose character into the lava, or whining about the incorrect show being on TV.
At the moment we limit video games to the weekend only and light TV during the week. Usually when they’re begging for screens it’s because they’re actually dying to use their brain and screentime tends to hit the right spots in the grey matter. Video games can be engaging but it’s not a substitute for real-world hand-eye co-ordination. Plus, there’s something to be said about using things with your hands and seeing that the world has a finite supply of things like paper, beads, and glue. It’s not just tangible, but consumable, bringing to light for the kids that fun and games actually have an impact on the world, positive and negative. Occasionally the Nintendo needs a battery replacement but it’s abstract compared to running out of pencil crayons or paper.
When we can spend time with the kids the lesson learned over and over is being present. I can’t emphasize enough how much it matters, and not just to the kids. Especially with Charlie I’m finally breaking out of the habit of reading my phone while he’s sitting between my legs. I used to justify it - oh he won’t notice, he’s playing - but it’s clear that he benefits from me being interactive, even for seemingly mundane things like handing him toys and watching him bite them. I am surprised when I interact with him how many times he looks toward me that I would not have noticed with phone in-hand. Kids are looking for something when they look into our eyes and we have a duty to provide it - reassurance, comfort, reciprocating their excitement - whatever it is.
Another thing I’ve learned - and credit for this goes to Andrea - is how capable kids are and how much responsibility we deny them. I came home one day to learn that the kids had been spreading their own toast with all their peanut butter, jam, cream cheese, etc. Cutting the toast with their knives too. It was a revelation to see a three-year-old doing this next to her five-year-old sister whom we had not given the same chance to at three. What else should we have allowed Annie to do at three that Alice is doing just fine?
It’s easy to see why we might believe our kids are not capable of anything so complicated. The common refrain among parents is keeping them safe (they might cut themselves!) or otherwise just wanting to get things done faster (no you can’t do that because we need to hurry). Our government also intervenes in our lives from time to time: did you hear about the dad in Vancouver that wasn’t allowed to send his kids on the bus “alone”? Here’s a dad who has learned the same lesson I have but he’s being told it’s unacceptable to teach his kids responsible use of public transit.
Giving our kids more responsibility has helped them grow in multiple ways. Putting our kids to work has helped them build confidence as well as helped us around the house. A dozen or so times I’ve gotten the girls to help me fold laundry, clean up messes, wipe the tables, and share other chores. Sometimes it’s slower than I could do it alone, sometimes faster. But every time it’s good for all of us. It builds a sort of community in the house that is stronger than when the parents do all the work and the kids lay about playing 24/7. And they mostly like helping.
Having learned all this, the idea of having a fourth child isn’t as scary as it once seemed. Of course we have other reasons we may stop at three (more on that in another post), but the work involved starts to ‘scale up’ around three kids and the pattern is the same: paying fair attention to each child, being present for them, and making them full members of the household instead of “just kids”.
The longer we hold back training them to be adults, the longer it takes for them to grow up. The stronger we work with them, the stronger we will all be.