Smiling Mom

Yup.  Four.  I had four Cab­bage Patch Kids.

Know how I remem­ber??  Each time I broke an arm as a child I got a ‘Kid.

Four.  Four breaks. Four ‘Kids.

Break #1 & Cab­bage Patch Kid #1

My brother dared me to hang by my toes from the mon­key bars at my grandma’s house.  If you know me per­so­nally, you know that I’m up for a challenge.

Yup.  Bro­ken arm.  What can I say, I was four…common sense elu­ded me that day.

Break #2 & Cab­bage Patch Kids #2

I was stan­ding on the balance beam at age five wai­ting for my turn to do my somer­sault when I began to day­dream when whoops, I fell.

Bro­ken arm num­ber two and the second addi­tion to my Cab­bage Patch Family.

Break #3…Cabbage Patch Kid #3

I was rollers­ka­ting in my front yard around the age of seven and trip­ped over a small rock.  At this point my pedia­tri­cian was begin­ning to know me by name… much to my mom’s chagrin.

Break #4…Cabbage Patch Kid #4

Six months later just before I ente­red second grade, on my mom’s birth­day in fact, I was pla­ying soc­cer in my back yard with my brothers and some friends when I trip­ped and fell.  I infor­med my mom that my arm was bro­ken and she reac­ted EXACTLY as I would.  It went something like, “Uh huh, Nette, just rest it for awhile… you’ll be fine.”  Awhile later I was still com­plai­ning about the pain when my mom took me down for another x-ray.  (It’s a won­der that I could even get preg­nant as an adult with the amount of x-rays that I’ve had in my life!) This time I, again, broke my arm.

So it’s clear that I was a fan of Cab­bage Patch Kids!  Hell, if my mom wouldn’t just go out and buy me one I’d up the ante and break my arm!

Hehe, ahem…

About a month ago I recei­ved an email from Team Mom let­ting me know that they’d be sen­ding me an new and very exci­ting NEW item to review.

Ladies and gent­le­men, please wel­come my daughter’s new and very exci­ting authen­tic, limi­ted time release Cab­bage Patch Kid, Jac­que­line Edith.

Kinda cute, right? Looks a bit like eClaire, no?  But really… do you think that I’d hand off a BRAND NEW CABBAGE PATCH KID for nothing in return???  Pu-LEASE!

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Stay tuned for the next edi­tion where Nette says to eClaire, “In FIVE DAYS Jac­que­line Edith can be yours IF and only if you stop suc­king your thumb.”

Dun-da-dun!

When I was young, my parents had strict con­se­quen­ces to bad beha­vior with regards to my brothers and me. They imple­men­ted vir­tually everything; res­tric­tion, door off of the bedroom, allo­wance charts, knee touching/hand hol­ding (more on that in a minute), cur­few.

Everything.

And I must say that my parents were very effec­tive dis­ci­pli­ner. They got three kids, an older brother, me and a youn­ger brother, out of our teens without any of us ever trying pot, snea­king out of the house, or drin­king. Quite a feat! They were a fierce team to be rec­ko­ned with.

There were many things that they did that were effec­tive. But mostly what got us through the days was there con­sis­tency. They were rock solid. If a threat was given, such as “Hey, if you leave this room, you will be (insert the punish­ment) for a week.” I’ll be dam­ned if they didn’t actually follow through with the threat each and every time!

There was a time that I stole a jour­nal from a friend’s desk and lied about it, resul­ting in a three week res­tric­tion. Another time I deci­ded to hit Ricky Kumor (a piece of shit kid, truly!) with my car because he wouldn’t move his big fat butt out of the middle of our cul-de-sac, resul­ting in my driver’s license being cut into three pie­ces and dri­ving pri­vi­le­ges revo­ked.… forever.

Ok, just to cla­rify, I really just tap­ped him, honest. But I was so irate when Ricky tur­ned around, after I hit him, and put a dent in the hood of the truck. I imme­dia­tely rever­sed my car, drove back home and told on Ricky. To which my dad asked, “Well, why did he dent the hood…”

“Because he’s such a jerk and wouldn’t move out of my way so I could get out of the cul-de-sac, so I hit him…well, it was just a tap, with the front bum­per of the car.”… Ya, bad move on my part. –Telling my dad, I mean!

The guy was such a jerk that two years before this event hap­pe­ned, he had haw­ked a loo­gie into my face from a foot away when I tried to break up a fight he was having at the bus stop. My parents couldn’t stand the kid and later I found out that they were actually hi–fiving each other when I wasn’t loo­king. Need­less to say, I got my license back 3 weeks later. I guess some hit and run offen­ses are justified.

But the most effec­tive con­se­quence ever imple­men­ted is what I fondly remem­ber as ‘knee touching/hand holding’.

I was, shall we say, a bit strong willed as a child. A term my dad now bes­tows on me with pride. But at 15, it wasn’t quite my best attri­bute. My youn­ger brother, JB, was, and still is, pretty passive-aggressive. He’s one that will attack quietly in the middle of the night after threa­te­ning you 12 hours ear­lier. Let’s just say that he’s the smar­ter one of us. I’m all sirens, bells and whist­les. Ever­yone knows when I’m upset!

So any­way, he and I were arguing nons­top, pro­bably for days! Now that I’m a mom, I sym­pathize with any parents who have to lis­ten to arguing all day long. Just thin­king about it is almost enough to drive me to drink! But this par­ti­cu­lar day JB and I were bad, really bad. Finally my dad said, “That’s it! I’ve had enough!!”

He sat the two of us down in the living room, crossed-legged. He made us touch knees and hold hands. This was our punish­ment. We wouldn’t be allo­wed to sepa­rate until when we sat quietly for two minu­tes. Just two minu­tes! Seems sim­ple, doesn’t it?? Well let me tell you, it was not!

JB LOVED this punish­ment. For a passive-aggressive per­so­na­lity, and someone who is way smar­ter than his sis­ter, this pro­mi­sed him nothing but loads of fun! I was irate. I screa­med, yelled, called my brother all kinds of names. He was sit­ting there silently, smi­ling with delight as he squee­zed my hands, nud­ged my knees and did just about anything he could do to get me going. Boy did it work. We pro­bably sat there for 20 minu­tes as I screa­med bloody mur­der. “I HATE HIM, Don’t you see what he’s doing? MAKE HIM STOP!”

Finally I wised up enough to be silent and ignore JB for the two minu­tes that was requi­red. I then stood up, kic­ked him and wal­ked away.

I look back and smile at the genius of this punish­ment. I was most likely the trou­ble maker in the pre­vious situa­tion, and I was punished the most!

When I was youn­ger I often com­plai­ned about a paren­ting deci­sion she made. To which she would always would say, “Well, honey, when you grow up and become a parent, you can do it differently.”

To which I would hotly reply, “Don’t worry, I will!”

I eat my words. I would do very few things dif­fe­rently. It’s funny how as I get older, my parents get smarter!