(This magazine has been completely revamped, so the following note may not be correct….)
Here you’ll find some selected ”Driving Sideways” columns from Columbus Parent magazine. Others can be accessed at www.columbusparent.com on the “Archive” link. (All work Copyright 2007, Kimberly Younkin.)
Columbus Parent, August 2007
Meal Mess No More
My grandmother will cringe when she reads this, but I don’t like to cook. This is a sad fact, since I’m stuck with prepping three meals and countless snacks daily until 2022—at the earliest.
Without a doubt, the most undesirable part of this stage of my kitchen incarceration is the cleanup. Since we have no pets, I spend oodles more time under my kitchen table mopping up the meal than I spend pushed up to the table, eating it. And I’ve spent about six hundred thousand dollars on stain remover for the laundry.
The other day, as I was on my hands and knees during another intimate moment with the tile grout in my dining area, I bumped my nose on a chair leg and yelled, “Eureka! I’ve found a way to beat this!” Well, I didn’t really say that, but I do have a brilliant strategy to combat the unholy meal messes.
Foodsuits!
Here’s how I see it working: all children under the age of ten will wear clothing made of food. Just plop on the edible outfit when the sun comes up and the kid can eat when, where and how much he wants. The kitchen table and floor will shine like a magazine cover, and there’ll be no clothes to wash because the kid will be naked by the end of the day.
The three main meals can make up the three basic garments, according to how much your child eats at each meal. If breakfast is her chow time, dress her in a snazzy pair of bacon pants with scrambled egg stitching on the inseam and hems and wheat-toast back pockets. For lunch, she can nibble on a turkey-and-cheese-slice t-shirt decorated with tiny heart-shaped strawberry slices and raisins on the sleeve cuffs.
A lighter dinner might be spaghetti-threaded underpants (best to make the undergarments the at-home dinner meal, since that’s the last thing to go).
If you’re finicky about refrigeration, freeze the outfit the night before and let it thaw on the child as the day goes on. This serves the dual purpose of preventing cottage cheese sock curdle and keeping the child cool during the scorching hot summer months. Also for summer, try hot dog shirts fresh from the crisper drawer. The dogs need to boil anyway, so just stick your child in direct sunlight at 11:30 and the shirt will be ready to eat by noon.
Winter refrigeration is a no-brainer; for something warmer, microwave hamburger- or pancake-pants and wrap the child snugly.
If you’re image conscious, customize foodsuits according to your own fashion preferences. No two suits ever need be the same—with fruit, vegetables, meats and grains available in all colors of the rainbow, the combinations are endless.
Picture yourself shopping at the mall, holding the hands of your six- and four- year-olds dressed in their finest foodsuits as people gape at you and say, “What a beautiful blouse your daughter is wearing! Look at your son’s handsome shirt!”
Instead of saying, “I got those on sale at Old Navy,” you smile and reply, “Thank you! They’re Swiss chard and endive with a sprinkling of fresh blueberries!”
Of course, it will be even colder at the mall than it already is, since all the children’s clothing stores will have their air conditioning cranked up for the perishable inventory.
You may have to throw some tomato-focaccia-bread jackets on the kids for the trip.
Columbus Parent, November 2007
The “Rent my Kid” Revolution
I work part-time from home, and when I’m not earning money, I’m searching for the next paying gig. My mind churns with ideas for adding household income while staying home with my boys in their younger years.
My most magnificent idea yet, as judged solely by me, is called “Rent My Kid.” It has the potential to revolutionize the home-based work segment of the employed population, mainly because it requires no work.
It’s a simple concept explained by its name. All you have to do is set an hourly rate for your child’s rental, do a little marketing, then tie his shoes and set him on the porch for pickup. It’s a cinch!
I hatched this brilliant scheme one afternoon while watching my friend’s daughters frolic and leap in their Snow White and Cinderella gowns, their lustrous manes of hair pulled back in thick pigtails with brightly-colored bands. These are outdoor girls who enjoy filthy rock-throwing days at the creek as much as the next kid, but they caught me in a girl-envy moment with the frolicking-princess thing.
That’s when a thought hit me: When your girl-envy strikes, go out and rent one!
It makes sense. I can’t really afford a whole other child of my own who’d cost about $750,000 to raise and probably not be a girl, anyway. But I can pay my friend twenty bucks an hour to rent her daughters during their girliest hours so I can braid their hair and paint their nails and watch The Sound of Music ‘til I sew my curtains into culottes. My friend makes $40, I get my “daughter” fix—everyone wins.
The concept is adaptable to any kind of envy, not just opposite-gender-child yearnings. Do you crave a calm afternoon with a child who’s as quiet as a breezy field of spring flowers? That’s sanity-envy. You can rent a child who plays silently for hours and loves pretend tea parties with stuffed bunnies. I’ve heard such children do exist.
Do you have peace-envy, where you ache for conflict-free sibling interactions? Rent two unrelated born negotiators, put them in a room full of candy and enjoy the sound of niceties such as, “No, I insist you take the last blue M&M” and “I will not rest until you accept my Dubble Bubble.”
Obviously, those who rent out the above-mentioned types of children will have no marketing expenses and charge the highest rates. Their at-home business will explode like the dotcom boom. Guaranteed.
Marketing costs will creep up for those of us trying to rent out children with more “spirited” qualities. For instance, to book paid timeslots for a child who never takes “no” for an answer, we’ll spend research dollars targeting potential renters who are petrified to ask for a raise at work or who plan to lobby Congress for education or healthcare funds.
To schedule a child who chatters even in her sleep, we’ll spend cash to find renters with broken TVs and stereos looking for background noise, or single dwellers snowed in with no phone service.
Want top dollar for a kicker-screamer? Go hang flyers at the local karate studio advertising for rent your mini practice partner.
I already did that last one, so if you see my flyer, please choose another studio, thank you.
I’m gonna be so rich…
Columbus Parent, June 2007
Shower Time
Happy news came last month when my husband and I learned that a family member is newly pregnant for the first time. Already, I’m looking forward to the expectant couple’s baby shower. I can’t wait to “ooh” and “aah” over cutesy gifts and mumble, “Oh, you’ll use that SO much,” while I stuff my face with cake.
It’s gotten me thinking about baby showers as a practice, and I’ve decided that they should not just be for babies. Parents should get baby showers for their kids, say, every five years or so.
Why? Because kids need new stuff for new stages, and because usually, at least one of the following applies:
1. The child was once a baby.
2. The child is acting like a baby. Or,
3. The child has begun asking questions about how people make babies.
Anyway, all children should be celebrated, right?
For example, my oldest son is five years old. He’s outgrown all the gifts we got for him at his baby showers, and in all fairness to him, he didn’t even feel the thrill of watching me tear them open.
Plus, he’s going through a tough phase right now. He’s a bit aggressive, uncooperative and defiant at times, and there’s a lot of equipment one needs for all that.
It’s high time my friends and family host another shower for us.
On my gift wish list is a football helmet, shoulder pads and shin guards built for all-day wear. These are for when he stomps away from me in a huff and throws a dirty look at me over his shoulder in lieu of watching where he’s going. That way, when he trips on a toy and falls, or cranks his knee bone on a sharp corner, he’ll be prepared.
Also a must is a handy little wireless gadget moms can use to put their twenty daily commands on a repeating loop so they don’t go hoarse saying, “Get off your brother’s head” and “I DARE you to throw that meatball.”
Oh, and I need speakers to plug it into and an intercom attachment to pump my voice through every room in the house.
(I can just see the people at my shower who have lived with five-year-olds, stuffing their faces with cake and nodding vigorously when I open that one).
And I really could use a cattle prod. Just for the fear factor.
Those gifts will be great for another five years, but what am I supposed to do when he’s ten?
I’ll need a remote-controlled house robot that extracts a child from the favorite, ratty t-shirt he’s worn six days in a row that smells like salmon scraps in the kitchen trash can.
And since sneakers can have air, blinking lights or even wheels in the soles, I’ll need a pair equipped with mini steel dumbbells that drop down on my command, anchoring my child’s feet to the ground every time an adult talks to him.
An automatic soap-mouth-washer-outer would be nice, too.
You get the picture.
When he’s fifteen, I’ll register for Bedroom Window Bars, a Bad-Influence Radar, and a Harry Potter Invisibility Cloak that I can throw on to see what’s happening behind that door that was just slammed in my face.
I may even throw something on there for myself, like a clone that’ll raise my teenagers while I’m sunning in Bali.
Let’s not stop at celebrating the arrival of the new baby.
Let’s party on.
Columbus Parent, May 2007
Mother’s Day Mondays
I’m thinking of making a play for a weekly Mother’s Day.
The current speedy holiday is a bit disappointing, sort of like a Thanksgiving dinner that takes three days to make and five minutes to eat.
I’d prefer Mondays. Someone can baby me out of bed from my long weekend where I stayed up past my bedtime, smeared Friday night pizza all over my face and shirt, and sparred with my little brother over first pick of the breakfast donuts.
Then, I’ll howl about not wanting to go to preschool today. It’s rough there. Nick and I arm wrestle for sole attention from our friend, Peter. Some days it’s the other way around.
And “free choice” play, first thing in the morning? Come on. How am I supposed to decide whether I want to role play with my Star Wars guys or trash my shirt with three kinds of paint and glitter?
After school I’ll demand my leftovers from dinner then scream my head off because they were thrown out. When someone caves and makes me another plate of dinner for my lunch, I won’t eat it.
Changing my mind every ten seconds is my prerogative, especially on My Day.
Between lunch and dinner, I’ll beg for a play date like a puppy for a chewy snack. I’ll call someone the Worst Person in the World when they say no. Then, when the Person isn’t looking, I’ll sneak out the side door to the back fence and ask Nathan over so he’s all ready to go when the Person comes outside looking for me.
(This is a slam dunk; everyone at my house loves Nathan.)
I like salmon a lot, so I’ll want that for dinner every Monday. No matter that it’s not yet back in season and costs $600 per pound. I don’t have to go to work, and I don’t know why anyone else does. Why can’t people just draw green dollars from construction paper? We have a whole stack of it.
After dinner, like I’ve been poked with a branding iron, I’ll dart outside with nothing on my feet but my new white socks. I’ll walk around on the blacktopped driveway for 10 minutes looking for a lost toy then come in and rub my socks all over my brother, who’s still eating.
At bath time I’ll be sad, of course, since My Day is ending. I’ll make sure to throw a bloodcurdling fit about not wanting to be the first one to be washed. Then (and this is the best!) I’ll race down the hall with my brother and body slam him into doors and walls.
It’s always fun to throw my weight around a little; a bit more on My Day.
The absolute best thing is to fake crying until I actually do make myself cry, just so someone will read me a few extra books at bedtime. I’ll crank it up a notch on Mondays, because I can. I might even get a 20-pager, or a Dr. Suess with goofy rhymes that ties someone’s tongue and makes them wish they had a glass of water. Icing on the cake.
Then I’ll fall into dreamland, where I’ll be greeted by “visions of sugarplums” and all that stuff.
I just don’t have enough of these kinds of days.
It’s not fair.
Copyright 2007, Kimberly Younkin
