Stranger Danger!

After school today, I took the boys out in the front yard to play with their dump trucks. They love to sit and load our landscaping rocks into their trucks and then push them around and dump them into a messy mountain. You can't get much more boy than that!

I decided it was a good time to practice a little something we all call "Stranger Danger." We have talked with Izzy about this before, and he has heard it at school as well, but I wanted to see him act out what he would do. I didn't prompt him at all, I just simply said, "Go in the grass and show me what you would do if a stranger pulled up and asked you to come look at his new puppy?" He giggled nervously and said a quiet, "no." Hmmm...I can see we have a little work to do. He knows the right thing to say "Yell. Go. Tell" (that is the anthem at school) but he was too shy to do it in front of me and Asher. That made me worried that if he was scared to yell and scream in front of me, how would he ever fight off an attacker? So we practiced over and over. Finally, by the end of it he was yelling "NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!" and showing me how fast he could run away. Then I stepped it up a notch and asked him what he would do if someone tried to take Asher and he was the closest to him? Without a word he grabbed Asher by the arm and took off like a flash of lightening and Asher not having a clue as to what was going on ran just as fast! He did great. Izzy then decided it would be great to pretend Asher was the stranger and he would yell No and run away. I think you can guess that game ended up in two boys just giggling and chasing each other. :) Either way, I feel a little more confident that Izzy will not speak to a stranger and if someone gets too close he wouldn't be embarrassed or scared to get into trouble. He also told me he knows how to fight someone if they tried to take him. Izzy hasn't hit anyone in his life, so I thought it would be interesting to hear what he thinks he would do. #1 Bite. #2 Punch in the "peanuts" lol #3 Poke them in the eyes #4 Kick them everywhere. Yep, I think that pretty much covers it.

Izzy had a super dramatic moment while we were outside as well that didn't have anything to do with our super acting skills. Somehow he got a splinter in his forearm. It was barely stuck in his arm and I could pull it out with my fingernails without even touching his skin. Izzy didn't seem to care about that small fact and begged me (picture more like hysterical screaming, the kind with enormous tears and snot running down his face) to get him a band-aid. Side Note: Why do kids automatically think a band-aid fixes everything? I explain a band-aid won't do the trick this time and ask him to be brave and just let me pull it out. I can't describe the completely crazy crying that happened in those few minutes. I get the splinter and one nano second later all of the tears and hysteria ends and he says "Thanks Mom." This whole situation got me to thinking about how a few of his friends have already started to lose their baby teeth. OH. MY. WORD. How will we cope if this is his reaction about a splinter? Really this is all my fault. I was the same way as a kid, so this is totally pay back. Good thing Daddy is going to be a Doctor, I can start passing this kind of stuff off on him.


A little time outside before dinner: educational and fun! Bonus: TONS of running made for two very tired boys. ;)