Epic Fail.....

You'd think we were rookies at this whole parenting thing.

Ever since James gifted me a new itouch 4 last week, Zach has decided that it is perfectly reasonable to expect that a four year old needs (not wants) one. In lieu of purchasing him one, he kindly offered to trade his ipod (which happens to be MY ipod that I finally just gave to him a few weeks ago because he whined constantly about not having one) for my itouch. He was convinced it was a good trade, and cried for an hour straight when I refused.

Now, I have known for a very long time that he his technological intelligence is far superior to mine. He picks up in 5 minutes what takes me an hour to comprehend. But that in no way entitles him to every toy I have, no matter how much I misuse or under-utilize it. And by toys, I mean all 3: my ipod (now HIS ipod), my laptop, and my itouch (Just a note- no one wants my phone. I couldn't even give it away that's how outdated it is. It represents why I finally deserved to get the new techy toy in the family).

That brings us to tonight. We were working with Zach on his letters and the conversation rolled back somehow to his wanting my itouch. So James offered up a compromise to him: we'd get him an itouch when he could learn all his letters and read. Brilliant right? Not so much. For while Zach jumped up and ran to the kitchen to work on the letter magnets on the fridge, he returned 60 seconds later declaring that he'd learned them and all dad now needed to take him to the store. He didn't get the whole "learning and memorizing" concept. He was also befuddled by the fact that we'd need actual proof of said learning, ie. that he could read an entire sentence without help. We were thinking an 18 month turnover- he was thinking 5 minutes. Our bad, obviously. A rookie mistake, bartering with a child. But we're not rookies. This is child number 3. It all just points back to the fact that it is absolutely indisputable that we are not supposed to have any more children.