Friday, October 17, 2008

Packing Initiative

As I think I mentioned in the cake decorating post, we are headed to Jim's parent's house and also for his brother and sister-in-law's fall festival. The kids are excited (Josie walks around saying "Bop, Bop" every time we mention it) and yesterday I did the "oh yeah, I might want to pack some clothes for us" realizing how close it was to time to actually go (we're driving down today). Andy was having some problem with one of his siblings and being the manipulative mom that I am I used distraction to deal with it. I said "Andy, how would you like to help me pack for Nana and Pop's?"
Of course he wanted to help.
Before my butt had even left the chair Andy came back with a big bag he wanted to pack in. I had to explain that we really needed a bag that would zip closed at the top (it was a big handled bag that he had emptied something out of in the laundry room).
Then he came back with another bag that did zip closed....but rather than getting an empty bag he had emptied our swim bag from the summer. Ok, I can deal with that and I am not going to discourage helping behaviors.
I finally get up and headed for his room and discovered that the child had already pulled clothes out of the drawer that he wanted to pack. He did remarkably well for a three year old.
For the two to three outfits per boy that I needed he had:
  • 7 shirts
  • 2 pairs of jeans and 3 shorts
  • 2 pairs of socks
  • 1 complete pj set and a half of a pj set
  • about a bazillion pairs of underwear
I didn' t think to ask him if that was just for him or if it was for both Doug and himself, but still not bad for a first attempt at packing. I did ask him if he intended to wear underwear at Nana and Pop's because right now the boys are still in pull-ups and only semi-willing to sit on the potty.

1 comment:

Ann in NJ said...

Hey, take what you can get! Any fostering of independence now can only get better in the future.