Technology of Love

If you know Catbird at all, you know she is completely besotted with her grandson.  Since Dear Boy lives in Indiana and Grammy Catbird lives in Sweet Home Austin, much of our relationship is through the wonders of video technology provided by Skype.  

Dear Boy is three years old and will begin Montessori School September 1, but potty training must be accomplished for this to succeed.  Dear Boy has the mechanics down, but would rather continue whatever has caught his focus than interrupt play to keep his pants dry.  Motivation has been difficult to maintain.  Dear Boy has patient and creative parents who continue to try new things.  Trying to help, Grammy Catbird offered to buy Dear Boy the gift of his choice if he could go one whole week with dry pants.  Dear Boy thought about it for a moment and replied, "hmm...well, maybe I could go one day."


A trip to the library (one of the wonderful things Dear Boy's parents do with him) turned up a Sid the Science Kid video that involved the use of charts.  Dear Boy loves Sid the Science Kid and his clever Mama was inspired to make a chart for recording potty successes, which Dear Boy was anxious to tell Grammy Catbird about on their last Skype call.


Grammy Catbird loves all things crafty and wanted to find out how Dear Boy enjoyed that process.  


She asked, "What did you use to make a chart?"
 "Stickers!"

Ah.  Grammy Catbird asked, "Great, and when you made the chart did you use...a squirt gun?"  
Dear Boy giggled and said, "nooOOOOooo..."  

"Did you use...Hairspray?"  
Again, giggles and "nooooOOOOooo.."


"Did you use a ruler?"  
Dear Boy looked confused, then looked at his Mama, who said,  "Um, actually, we used the computer."


Oh.

A computer.


Of course.

Clearly Grammy Catbird was conjuring images from the middle of the previous century. Sigh... My physicist says someday we may be called upon to demonstrate the lost skills of an earlier era.  Catbird keeps an old cigar box stocked with crayons,  construction paper, scissors and a ruler for just such an occasion.  She has a recipe for playdough in her head, too, and knows how to create a fort from dining chairs and old blankets.  Whether the situation calls for computer technology or paste and paper, when it comes to her grandson, Grammy Catbird is ready.