Mama Needs a Cosmo

Benny turned three in July.

And, poor little guy, he didn’t get a party or balloons or even a CAKE.

Because he’s the 2nd child. And second children get the shaft until they’re old enough to know better. And, not only that, but he’s ONLY THREE. All he cared about was that someone sang him the birthday song and gave him ice cream and a toy that made lots of noise.

It looks like a tender moment, but what you don't see here is Benny flinging the spoon at his brother 10 seconds later.

One of the things that we parents must constantly remember is that our children are little sponges. They take in and devour whatever grown-ups say, do, or listen to, then regurgitate it in public.

Like the time we were at the park and Jake decided to scream to me from the swings, “Oh . . . My . . . GOD . . . Becky. Look at her BUTT!” after a rather large woman walked by. I pretended not to know him.

Then there’s the little stuff.

I talk about photography quite a bit around my boys — on the phone with potential clients, reading excerpts from trade magazines, and trying to explain composition and lighting concepts to the LOML.

So this past weekend I shouldn’t have been all that surprised by Benny’s choice of words while trying to get my attention for a photo op.

“Mama!! Be still and I shoot you. Chick-haaah.”

Now, if you’ve been following me for a while, you know that I have a thing about guns: I don’t like them. So imagine my reaction as I heard those words come out of my toddler’s mouth and into the ears of the other moms and dads on the playground.

Horrified, I said, “You shoot me? I don’t understand? And what is ‘chick-haaah’?”

Which is unusual for me because I’M usually the one who gets looked to for a ruling on Ben-ese when no one else can understand him.

Then he ran to this little toy goggle contraption, pointed at it, and said, “I SHOOT you mama.” After which, he came over to me, pointed at my Nikon, and said “Chick-haaah.” And had he been a little older, he probably would have followed up with “My mom is such a DUMB ASS.”

This is my 2010 Valentine’s Day Bouquet, picked fresh this morning from our front lawn, compliments of Benny and Jake.

Far be it from me to tell them that they picked me a bunch of yellow weeds.

The LOML and I were late in starting a “measurement wall” for the boys. It wasn’t until Jake was 3 1/2 that we began to track his height, and Ben was nearly 3 when we started tracking his. (At least we used the same wall.)

Yes, those are diced tomatoes. Why we chose the kitchen pantry wall for this gig I'll never know.

Anyhoo, we decided to see if the boys had grown any since November 2009 (last track date), and imagine our surprise when we found that they’d grown a collective four inches in three months. Seriously.

If I don't buy this kid some new school pants soon, he's going to be known as "high-water" boy. We shopped for those pants in August.

Two inches, baby. Two inches since November. This one eats and drinks three times his body weight in a week. Is 3' 3" tall. And weighs 40 pounds. AT AGE 2 1/2. I keep waiting for Jerry Maguire to call.

The LOML won this handy dandy beverage cooler for me 12 years ago at the California State Fair by putting a dart through a balloon. This was waaay back when no one cared about the Colts and Peyton Manning had just graduated from Tennessee.

The carnie tried to give us a 49er cooler, but I asked for the Colts one instead.

“Shi-itt . . . I’d-a given that to you for free.”

Sorry Saints fans. You got a good story and all, but the Colts are just plain better. Buh-bye now.