Smugness, Henry, and the "great idea"

You all know Henry.


Sometimes referred to as Henri(pronounced with a cajun accent), Hank-by his Granger-boy cousins, or Bubby-my oh so silly affectionate name for him.

Henry is a boy, as you know. Which means he finds new things to do every day.

One fine day when it was actually sunny here, Kate and I made bread.

It was fortunate I had Kate helping me cuz well, I hate kneading bread.

So while I conveniently nursed Nora on the couch, Kate kneaded the bread with her ever lengthening limbs and long fingers.

Being caught up in attempts to streamline my life a little, I just started the rice for dinner before sitting down with Nora.

How does that help streamline my life, you may ask?

Well...I usually forget the rice til it is too late to have it ready for dinner. Something about starting it 45 minutes earlier than the rest of dinner throws me off.

So on this day, I started it at 3:30, then it could stay warm and it would be done already.

Pat pat on my back.

So I'm nursing Nora, Kate is kneading, and Henry discovers the container of open rice.


I hear "Nooooo Henry!" coming from Kate.

Somewhere in the process of trying to pick up the container, he actually dumped half of it out on the floor.

Then proceeds to dance a jig in it and swish it from side to side with his dimpled little hands.

So I think to myself, no problem, not a big deal.

I put Nora down, happily sucking her fingers while a fresh stream of drool and milk flow down her chin, and proceed to the kitchen to clean up the mess.

That's when it hit me, my GREAT idea.

It's brilliant, I'm so smart, look at me, their going to give me mom of the year!

Why don't I sweep up all the rice and put it in bowls for Henry to play with?

It's pure genius!

He can have his little fix of playing with things he shouldn't and I won't feel like the rice was wasted.

Side note-it's not that the rice is bad cuz it touched the floor, its that it's IMPOSSIBLE to sweep up rice without sweeping up everything else that may be on your floor, and who wants to find odds bits of unidentifiable stuff while you're eating your rice? Eeww.

So I go for it, all systems go, full steam ahead, ready at will!


And what do you know?

He loves it of course!

He's in 2 year old Heaven. Happily scooping the rice back and forth from bowl to bowl.

He spills a few grains of rice, but no big deal, right? I already cleaned up Rice Mountain, a few grains will be easy after that.

But soon, as all good things do, this comes to an end.

And Henry realizes there are waaay funner things to do with the rice than just scooping it from bowls.

Smug patting of my own back? Gone.

Remember to have him go outside with the rice next time? Got it.