A Chip Off the Old Block

There are lots of amazing things when it comes to watching your children grow. One of the things that always gets me is how different from one another my kids are. And how they inherit things that aren’t actually physical traits, like mannerisms and behavior.

Aubrielle is a lot like me. Poor kid. When she first started feeding herself, she would organize her food. If you gave her mixed veggies, in short order she had them sorted so they weren’t mixed veggies any more. I never had to ‘teach’ this kid ‘how’ to clean. As a matter of fact, I really didn’t know that it was something that you had to learn. Until I had Aria. Aria, well, she takes after her Daddy’s side of the family. She looks like them, sounds like them, and has a lot of the same facial expressions and mannerisms that they do. This kid is a nut. And she is totally lost when it comes to cleaning up. I have to break ‘Clean your room!’ down into a series of smaller tasks, otherwise she just doesn’t know what to do. I have hope for her, because my husband’s aunts all keep clean houses, but I have to admit, I do wonder what little Miss Aria is going to do when she has to keep her own house… Bud, he’s another story. He doesn’t so much take after his Dad’s side of the family, as much as he takes after his Dad specifically.

Aubrielle is the cleaner, the sorter, the organizer. Aria is the tornado, who, even when she tries to clean, makes a bigger mess than what she started with. Bud is a stuffer and a stacker. Just like his Dad. He will clean up the floor, and stack everything on top of his bed and dresser. He’ll stuff his stuff into the dresser drawers and into the toy box.

When the kids went to school I went through their rooms, and really had a hay day cleaning out Bud’s toy box. Let me tell you, he had a bunch of stuff stuffed in that thing. I got rid of all of the baby toys, all of the trash, half of the ‘fleet’ of paper airplanes which I will have to tell you about later. And I put all of the dirty laundry in the hamper to be washed. I organized all of the toys, and even though the toy box is now half empty, the improvement is huge. Bud noticed within a few minutes of being home, and was thrilled that he could find all of his stuff. He played in the room for a couple of hours.

Later on in the day, I went into his room and saw his shoe box on the bed. I picked up the shoe box with a sinking feeling in my gut. I already knew what was going on, but I had to know for sure. I opened the box, and found that it was full of his hot wheels. My suspicions were confirmed.

I don’t think my husband has ever voluntarily gotten rid of a shoe box. He loves them. Really. He will keep shoe boxes and put ‘stuff’ in them. And then stuff the stuffed shoe boxes where ever he can. It’s the stuffer in him.

So, when Valdemar got home from work, and it was time to get the kids in through the shower and ready for bed, he found Bud’s shoe box on the bed. He picks it up and takes a look at the contents, and asks me if I put the hot wheels in there. I told him “No, Bud did that.” And Valdmar replies, with obvious pride in his voice, “That’s something I would do!”

Don’t I know it buddy, don’t I know it!