Stock Up Now for Summer Visits

Ever since I got married relatives have been sending their kids to visit during the summer when they’re out of school. First it was my little brother and sisters. When they grew up and had children, it’s been nieces and nephews too. Then it was adopted children, semi-adopted children and then their children - my grandkids. Since I’ve generally been a mostly at-home Mom and Grandma, this (wherever we’re living at the time is ‘this’) is where the kids come. We don’t mind.

Yet the visitors are mostly “city kids,” who aren’t trained and accustomed to looking out for issues here in the country that simply don’t arise in the city. Looking both ways before crossing the street, knowing how to trigger the crossing light, being wary of strangers, keeping the doors and windows locked and being in constant cell-phone distance from a parent or caregiver are all very useful skills in the city. Out here where the nearest paved road is half a mile away and nobody can “drive by” there’s other things to worry about.

The grandson who has lived here with us for 16 of his 18 years has never run into serious trouble. Grandson #2 and nephew #1 from baby sister have both had losing run-ins with copperheads, another nephew nearly broke his ankle trying to run straight down the terraces (but at least he didn’t take a nose-dive off the cliff), and we’ve installed a stop sign at the railroad crossing because we’ve always been paranoid of that. Only a few visitors ever got really lost, luckily we have very good girl-dogs who will always tell us if a kid’s in trouble, lead us right to them.
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Filed under Grandchild Visits, Safety, Babysitting, Crafts, Family Life, Generational Learning | Comments (3)

Managing The Weaponry

…and Laying Down the Law

It was an action-packed weekend. A total of 4 daughters (one by birth, three by stray whose kids call me “Aunt Granny”) one stray son and five semi-grands plus #1 grandson. Here for the youngest semi-grandson’s eighth birthday on Sunday. To make matters worse, the weather was absolutely dismal so there could be no friendly campfire for Peep-roasting, the ins and outs of having all those people coming and going from the cold and wet into the house completely trashed the place so that it’s taken two days just to reclaim the living area.

There were some issues that arose, particularly in regards to the younger boys (8 and 10) and 17-year old #1 grandson’s ample collection of serious weaponry that he just can’t seem to keep put safely away because he practices with them so often. I had to collect ninja knives and Samurai swords, one rapier and several heavy fantasy swords from them at various times, which they’d managed to fish out of some gawd-awful corner of grandson’s outrageously messy room when nobody was looking. The girls (4 and 14) were, as usual, perfect angels - ratted out those boys every time…

#1 Grandson lives here, graduates high school this year, and is an only child. This place is far out in the country with no immediate neighbors, surrounded by National Forest. When he was younger (about 8), we began allowing him to collect wooden practice swords and staffs, gave him form lessons to keep him busy. Our son (who died when grandson was just 2) had a double black belt in a weapons form of Kung-Fu (was also an amazing juggler and seasoned performer who once toured demonstrating his weapons skills on stage with his master). Grandson had inherited a lot of practice and show weapons, bought more once we allowed that beginning when he was 12. He makes spectacularly detailed Samurai armor by hand too, as well as fantasy chess sets from Sculpy - he’s extremely talented, we’ve always encouraged it.

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Filed under Rules, Weapons, Safety, Grandchild Visits, Older Children, Family Gatherings, Discipline | Comments (2)