Pockets

I don’t remember exactly when Charlie figured out that his clothes have pockets. It was a while ago, and it was cute. He would walk around the house with his hands in his jeans, smiling ear to ear and it made me smile ear to ear. He looked like a mini Calvin Klein model.

About a week ago Charlie found a new purpose for pockets. It is no longer good enough to just put his hands in his pockets; he has to fill those pockets with something. I have always heard, from other mothers with boys, that they will collect things like sticks and rocks. Charlie does not collect things. Yes, we have a million Matchbox Cars, but no rock collections. I have been so thankful that my house is not full of sticks, rocks, or any other item from nature. But something is changing; I think my house will soon be filled with sticks and rocks. Here’s how it went down….

Charlie and I went outside to play football in the front yard. As soon as we stepped foot in the grass I stepped in dog poop. That is a whole different story about our crappy neighbor, but I will save that for another day. Long story, short – I decided to clean up the dog poop. While I was doing so, Charlie was just hanging out, running around, and doing nothing suspicious looking. We played “football” which involves me throwing the ball, Charlie picking it up, and me pushing him down. After I got about 35 tackles and no one scored any touchdowns, we decided to head inside. We go in, take off our shoes, and I tell Charlie to take his coat off. He takes his coat off and I walk into the living room to find birdseed ALL OVER! I said, “Charlie, what is all of this birdseed doing in the house?” He replied, “It was in my pocket.” I asked, “Why did you put birdseed in your pocket.” And he replied, “Because.”

I think Charlie and I both learned a few lessons here:

1.       Never turn your back on a kid by a bird feeder

2.       Never answer your child’s questions with “because”, because some day they will do it back to you

3.       Never put birdseed in your pockets because mommy will make you use the dust buster and clean it up

I almost decided it would be a good idea to sew all of Charlie’s pockets shut, and then I remembered… I can’t sew.