First post-newborn father-toddler story…

Well, it was bound to happen eventually… here is a funny little anecdote about the first morning after Little “X” (our new addition to the famiy) came home. This story, however, is about myself and our two-year-old, Little “L”… who is have some slight lifestyle adjustment issues…

Little “X” and Mommy finally came home from the hospital last Friday which turned Little “L’s” little world on its head…

SIDE NOTE: I’ve just started to confuse myself with Little “L” and Little “X” already. So, from now on, I’ll refer to our new guy as Baby “X” and our older boy as Little “L”.

Little “L” decided to wake up at 5:15 AM Saturday morning — not at all his normal scheduled waking time. Okay, so I’m in charge of Little “L” right now because Mommy/Wife “T” had that C-section which means she can’t really pick him up for five more weeks (which really breaks Mommy’s heart)… which also means that I have to get up with him if he gets up early. So at 5:15 AM, Saturday morning, we are up and ready for milk and cereal, and playtime… or at least Little “L” was…

After Little “L” finished his cereal he wanted to play… with all the noisy toys, of course. Trying to clam/quiet him down didn’t work and only frustrated the poor little guy. I’m sure it didn’t help that I was pretty much asleep on my feet while trying to interact with him. So, I had to resort to what every “good” parent and self-righteous-would-be-parent (you’d be surprised how many would-bes there are) “tisk-tisk” and frown upon… the television. Little “L” is already quite the TV-junkie… zones out completely.

So the TV (parent-of the-year-award killer) acted as a welcomed distraction for a rambunctious Little “L” and a very tired Daddy… actually, I fell asleep on the floor next to him. Don’t worry I have a method of knowing where he is… I take my finger and twist it into his shirt or pantleg, so to move he has to yank my finger free which wakes me up… except for this day…

Well, it did wake me up but I didn’t actually get up (character flaw) and just drifted somewhere between the land of the dreaming and the land where I wish I were dreaming… I could hear Little “L” go out into the kitchen and start digging through one of the drawers. I pseudo-incoherently asked him to stop playing in the drawer and to come out of the kitchen… I dozed off again… Little “L” proceeded to listen to the requests of his apparently-not-so-great-role-model-of-a father and came out of the kitchen like a good little boy… with a surprise…

Little “L” came over to sleeping-me and dumped an entire Ziplock bag of his old metal baby utensils on me to wake me up. This worked briefly but I was honestly so exhausted that I just dozed off again. So, Little “L” decided that he did not like me pretending I was a Sleeping Beauty Beast and started jabbing me with the only fork that was in the Ziplock bag… Naturally, I wake up, a bit stunned from this rude but appropriately-timed awakening. I ask Little “L”, “What are you doing?” And he just looked at me with wide eyes and a smile and said, “Fork!”, and went right back to jabbing me until I got up off the floor to play with him.

So, I was up for the day quite early that Saturday… and now I am no longer actively avoiding caffeine. Infact, later that same day I went to the grocery store to buy some really strong coffee and filters.

steelie

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