Tuesday, March 6, 2012

Hovering

I am beginning to think that Tom and I have been a little, let’s say, over protective of Alyssa over the past nine years.

Take for example Saturday morning. She wanted some strawberries. I was heading down the stairs with laundry so I suggested she get some for herself.

She asked, “But what about the green stuff?”

“The stems?” I asked, pausing halfway down the basement to look back up at her.

She nodded.

I suggested, “Cut them off.” Seemed like a simple solution to me.

She was horrified at the very suggestion. “With a knife?” she asked as if I’d suggested she trim her nails with the lawn mower. “But I might cut myself!”

I told her to just pull the stems off then. Wow. Let’s remember that’s she’s nine. I’m thinking there are a lot of nine year olds out there with the dexterity to safely manipulate a knife to cut the leaves and stems off a few strawberries.

I guess I need to let her ‘help’ in the kitchen more. But that’s always so much more work than just doing it myself.

And yes, that very sentence there is what has led to this problem in the first place. I need to get over myself.

So an hour or so later, Alyssa got off the couch, carried her empty cup into the kitchen, handed it to me and asked, “Will you get me some water?”

OMG! Seriously? She was already almost back to the couch when I called her back to the kitchen, where I led her two feet from where she’d handed me the cup and showed her how to turn on the faucet and get her own damned water.

Let me state here that the girls did actually already know how to turn on the faucet, she just didn’t want to take those extra three steps to the sink.

Egads.

But on the bright side, I taught her to clean the litter box last week. It is now one of her chores, along with feeding the fish, making sure the cat has food and water and bringing her lunchbox to the counter each evening to be emptied.

And this very morning, she helped me pack her lunch. Which is a good thing because I’ve decided that fourth grade is a marvelous year for her to start packing her own lunch. Under supervision, of course. For posterity sake, let me point out that Alyssa has never once eaten a lunch that was prepared by the school cafeteria. Oh no, she has carried her lunch to school every single day for almost four years (k through third grade.)

I do realize that the whole lunch thing is my fault too. But! I’m going to give myself a little credit here and point out that I’m attempting to make a few changes as we go along. It’s a step toward a little less hovering on my part.

2 comments:

Tiffany said...

It's hard not to hover...but so important that they gain their independence!

Julie said...

Aaah, helicopter mommas. :)

Alyssa is a sweet, beautiful, caring and soon to be independent young lady! You are doing great.

Just wait until she takes those independent skills and starts baking cookies, pouring a glass of milk and bring YOU a snack while you are watching tv. It's a fabulous thing.

Julie