She has done it again... my five year old has me stumped. After surrendering my nice comfy California King bed to my two pint sized princesses last night, (apparently little girls do not understand that your head goes towards the top and feet towards the bottom) I demoted myself to my five year olds twin bed, complete with Ariel bedspread and matching sheets. Yeah, it is as anti-manly as the Hello Kitty bathroom! Anyway, I was at least able to get a few hours sleep without a combination of little feet or a head crammed in my back.
When they woke up this morning they were full of energy, as they should be - I mean they had the most comfortable bed in the house, bless their hearts. I am not bitter, I am happy - I love it when my feet hang off a bed (just kidding - when they are happy and laughing it is the best feeling a parent can have.) OK, where was I. My tiny divas came out to the living room, apparently they had a vote and needed me to drive them to the donut shop. I guess I should be thankful that they still need me to drive, otherwise I would have been left out. They had also decided that they would go in their night gowns, complete with high heeled dress up shoes! At this point I could either resist and refuse to drive, or enjoy the moment.
So now I feel like Heff walking to the car, two little ladies in their princess night gowns and high heeled shoes sashaying to the car. I buckled their car seats and away we went. I went by the bank to get some cash and that is where the five year old started to take over. I noticed she was studying me as I put the money on the center console of the car but I dismissed it, after all it was early and it sometimes takes her a bit to wake up. We get the donuts and start to head home, little did I know it would be an interrogation, she might as well had the phone books and rubber hoses standing by.
"How many dollars did you get daddy?" Yes, the innocence in her voice suckered me right in.
"Baby, don't worry about money. Daddy will worry about money and we have enough." Innocent enough right?
"No daddy, how many dollars did you get?" I could feel the bead of sweat starting to form and my mouth started to get dry. She is just five, give her a quick answer.
"Twenty baby, daddy took out twenty dollars." OK crisis over. Lets go eat. But no, she had other plans for me.
"NO DADDY! I see a lot of dollars, how many did you get?" I could see this was going to be bad, but then I had a brilliant thought. I held up a twenty dollar bill and decided to explain money. We had messed with pennies, nickles, dimes, and quarters - how hard could it be, this has the number right on it.
" Here baby, see this? This is twenty dollars, this one bill is twenty. Now this one is one dollar bill. Just like the pennies and nickles, remember?" Yes I felt like Micheal Jordan in his prime. We had the isolation play going and I had the ball standing there toe to toe, dribbling and thinking "I got you. Daddy's the man!" Then those little words echoed through the car...
"No!" Yep, no more Micheal. Or maybe I was Mike and she just changed the game on me - we were now playing baseball and she was Nolan Ryan! Curve ball coming up! Everyone knows Micheal Jordan couldn't hit a curve!
"Baby it is like the pennies. We said it takes five pennies to make one nickle. Dollars are the same, you have to look at the numbers on the bills." Swing and a miss - strike two. The next statement brought me to my knees.
" OK daddy, we have one tree in yard right?"
" Yes baby there is one tree." I was spinning. She was winding up and smirking at me.
"That is one tree in our yard. Just like we have one tree, HOW MANY DOLLARS DID YOU GET?" Strike three, Loser! So I decided to use the old reliable parenting tactic, change the subject! I knew I was out of my league, so I did the next best thing...
"Hey, we still want to go to the zoo today?" Yep, I found myself back on the basketball court, that tongue starting to poke out a bit....
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