The first thing you do when beginning your baby registry is fill out a little form so they can give you a scanner gun & put your information into the system. While we were waiting for my sister to fill out the form, Flik was sitting very patiently, waiting for the scanner gun we had promised him. The BRU lady was really good with kids and was asking him lots of questions and keeping him from getting fidgety.
BRU lady: How old are you.
Flik: One. Two. Three. Four. Four years old.
BRU lady: And are you going to have a baby cousin?
Flik: Yes.
Mommy: And are you going to have a boy cousin or a girl cousin?
Flik: A girl cousin.
Mommy: And what kind if baby did Mommy have? A boy or a girl?
Flik: A boy. We have three boys at home.
Mommy: (Hmm. I wonder who this third baby is.) THREE boys?
Flik: Yes. Z, me, and Daddy. (Duh!)
Mommy: Aaaahhhhh! Well then What about Indie and Boo? (our dogs)
Flik: Oh yeah. Five boys.
BRU lady: Wow. You know you are very smart for a four year old? (to me) That's really impressive.
Flik: Yes.
BRU lady: (to me) That really is impressive for four.
Lessons learned during this exchange:
1) Even though I LOVE observing my boys (what they comprehend, what they don't, how they see the world) there are still things that I miss. In this case, I didn't notice that it is pretty impressive that my 4yo added 3+2 without skipping a beat. No fingers. No pause. Just, "oh yeah, 5." He's cool.
2) If you want to get on a mom's good side, a) befriend her kid and then b) sound sincere when you compliment her kid. Call her kid smart, polite, well-behaved, whatever. If you sound sincere, she will believe it. She wants to believe it.
3) My kid might be smart, but he is not modest. Apparenty, "yes," he does know how smart he is. My guess is that this will not change substantially until he hits his 30's.
